groups extending for around 10 km. The entire set of dikes forms a line extending for 250 km. Individual segments overlap, with the overlapping portions thinner, so that the combined thickness of the two overlapped portions is about the same as the thickness of a single segment. Other examples of en echelon dikes are the Inyo dike of Long Valley, California, US; the Jagged Rocks complex, Arizona, US; and the dikes of oceanic spreading centers. Dikes range in composition from basaltic to rhyolitic, but most are basaltic. The texture is typically slightly coarser than basalt erupted at the surface, forming a rock type called diabase. The grain size varies systematically across the dike, with the coarsest grains normally at the center of the dike. Dikes formed at shallow depth commonly have a glassy or fine-grained chilled margin 1 to 5 cm thick, formed where the magma was rapidly cooled by contact with the cold surrounding rock. Shallow dikes also typically show columnar jointing perpendicular to the margins. Here the dike rock fractures into columns as it cools and contracts. These are usually 5- to 6-sided, but 3- to 4-sided columns are also common. These are fairly uniform in size within a single dike, but range from a few centimeters to over 0.3 meters across in different dikes, tending to be thicker in wider dikes. Larger columns are likely a consequence of slower cooling. Dike rock is usually dense, with almost no vesicles (frozen bubbles), but vesicles may be seen in the shallowest part of a dike. When vesicles are present, they tend to form bands parallel to walls and are elongated in direction of flow. Likewise, phenocrysts (larger crystals) on the margins of the dike show an alignment in the direction of flow. In contrast to dikes, which cut across the bedding of layered rock, a sill is a sheet intrusion that forms within and parallel to the bedding. Formation Mafic magma (fluid magma low in silica) usually reaches the surface through fissures, forming dikes. At the shallowest depths, dikes form when magma rises into an existing fissure. In the young, shallow dikes of the Hawaiian Islands, there is no indication of forceful intrusion of magma. For example, there is little penetration of magma into the walls of dikes even when the walls consist of highly porous volcanic clinker, and little wall material breaks off into the molten magma. These