But
something was happening far, far below that 14,100-foot peak. The
Pacific Ocean plate was diving below the tectonic plate on which
Sumbawa and the other Indonesian islands sat, and the rubbing
together of the rocks was heating up the area, melting rocks, and
sending magma up crevices.
The crater at the top of the peak (called a caldera) began to
rumble. At one point, a dark cloud formed above the volcano.
The
volcano had been dormant for hundreds and hundreds of years, but it
looked like it was waking up. Sure enough, on this date in 1815, an
eruption spit out ash and gas.
The
people of the nearby village of Tambora—and the people of the
island of Sumbawa—and even the people of the other Indonesian
islands, hundreds of miles away—heard thunderous booms. Ash started
to fall from the skies.
Five
days later, the largest volcanic eruption in history shook
Tambora-the- mountain and, sadly, eliminated Tambora-the-village.
The
Tambora eruption was TEN TIMES more powerful than the more famous
Krakatoa eruption of 1883!
 |
| This chart compares the eruption of Tambora to three smaller but more famous eruptions: Mt. Vesuvius, which destroyed Pompeii; Krakatoa, also in Indonesia; and Mount St. Helens, in Washington state. |
On
April 10, 1815, even the people on Sumatra island, more than 1,600
miles away (2,600 km), heard the sounds of the explosion. (Most
thought at first that it was the sound of guns being fired.) Three
columns of flame rose up from the mountain, which soon became covered
with “liquid fire.” Pumice stones fell from the skies, followed
by more volcanic ash. Some of the pumice was as large as 8 inches (20
cm) in diameter! Hot gas and rock flowed down all sides of the
mountain and into the ocean.
And
the ash fell. And fell. And fell some more.
Some
of the tiniest particles of ash stayed high up in the atmosphere, and
blew around in the wind currents, and blocked the sun. The next year,
1816, was called “The Year Without a Summer” in the United States
and Europe, because the volcanic eruption put so much ash and sulfur
into the atmosphere that more sunshine was reflected away from the
Earth, back into space, and the temperatures dropped all over the
world. This phenomenon is called a volcanic winter—and during this
one, it snowed in Boston, Massachusetts, in July!
Like
any global climate change, this volcanic winter caused hardship and
death as some crops failed, some livestock died, and thousands of
people starved.
A
Cultural “Museum”
Tambora
is now called the Pompeii of the East because archaeologists have
begun to excavate the lost culture of Tambora that had been buried by pyroclastic flows. The team of scientists
had to cut through a “pavement” of pumice and hardened ash about
10 feet (3 m) thick!
Archaeologists have found bronze bowls, ceramic pots, iron tools, and other
artifacts from the once-thriving village--exactly as they were almost 200 years ago.
Also
on this date:
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