The westernmost volcanic center of the 2500-km-long Aleutian arc, Buldir consists of the older Buldir volcano at the center of the island and the younger East Cape volcano forming the NE portion of the island.  The 656 m high point of the island is a tuff cone that tops the older center.  A plug dome forms the 610-m-high summit of East Cape volcano, which has two principal peaks.   The youngest volcanic feature on the isolated, 4.2 x 7.2 km island is a lava dome on the SE flank of East Cape volcano.  The dome was considered by Coats (1951) to be of Pleistocene age based on morphologic considerations.  Smith and Shaw (1975) suggested that the volcano may have been active within the last two thousand years, however, Holocene activity is uncertain, and the volcano may have ceased activity during the Pleistocene (Motyka et al. 1993, Nye et al. 1998).  The flora on Buldir is less varied than on neighboring islands, suggesting that Buldir is relatively young.