Specifically identified here are the four features namely, Red Cinder Dome, Pakushin cone, the Sugarloaf and the Point Kadin vents.

[6] According to the history recorded by the Alaska Volcano Observatory: “The first episode began in Pliocene or early Pleistocene time (the oldest known age of lavas is 0.93 Ma [Nye, 1990]) and produced extensive flows and subordinate pyroclastic deposits of basaltic and andesitic composition, which enlarged the island by several kilometers along the northwest coast.

Andesitic pyroclastic-flow and debris flow deposits occur in glaciated valleys on the north and south sides of the volcano indicating a Holocene age for the caldera-forming eruption.

"[9] Historically, Makushin is one of the most active volcanoes in the Aleutian Islands, erupting at least two dozen times over the past several thousands years, the last in 1995.

[13] Although the volcano has not erupted since 1995, studies conducted between July 1996 and August 2000 recorded some 176 minor earthquakes registering between 0.1 and 3.2 on the Richter Scale, occurring on average 2 to 3 times a month.

[9][16] Compared with the other Aleutian strato-volcanoes in the region, which have steep profiles, the Makushin volcano is a contrast that exhibits a broad and dome like structure with an ice field coverage of 40 km2 (15 sq mi).

[13] About 8 kilometers (5.0 mi) to the south of this volcano is the “composite Pakushin cone” that has multiple craters, which is 4000 years old eruption; pyroclastic flows and surges have been reported here.

[10] John Muir, the Scottish-born American naturalist (1838–1914), in his book "The Cruise of the Corwin (1881)", has vividly described this volcano: The noblest of them all was Makushin, about nine thousand feet high and laden with glaciers, a grand sight, far surpassing what I had been led to expect.

The extreme summit of Makushin was wrapped in white clouds, and from beneath these the glaciers were seen descending impressively into the sunshine to within a thousand or fifteen hundred feet of sea-level.

This fine mountain, glittering in its showy mail of snow and ice, together with a hundred other peaks dipping into the blue sky, and every one of them telling the work of ice or fire in their forms and sculpture—these, and the sparkling sea, and long inreaching fiords, are a noble picture to add to the thousand others which have enriched our lives this summer in the great Northland.

The study has established that such an energy generation from the geothermal resources would be cheaper than the diesel power system existing on the island.