And now for something a little different...

Modern day Krakatoa

OK. This article has absolutely nothing to do with anything I normally blog about. No politics, religion or social issues and the history is incidental. To be honest it's something I have a hard time imagining I would go looking up barring a bad case of insomnia. But the article was featured on refdesk, my favorite omnibus website and the home page for my browser. And somehow I got sucked into it. My interest in geology ranks right up there with my interest in periodic tables and other things I was forced to memorize in High School. I did take a geology course in college which thanks to a remarkable professor was actually somewhat interesting. But again it's not really my cup of tea. So don't ask me why this particular article grabbed my attention. But it did.

Krakatoa (Indonesian: Krakatau), also spelled Krakatao, is a volcanic island in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. The name is used for the island group, the main island (also called Rakata), and the volcano as a whole.

Significance

Further information: 1883 eruption of Krakatoa

Its best known eruption culminated in a series of massive explosions on August 26–27, 1883, which was among the most violent volcanic events in modern times. With a Volcanic Explosivity Index of 6,[2] it was equivalent to 200 megatons of TNT — about 13,000 times the yield of the Little Boy bomb (13 to 16 KT) that devastated Hiroshima, Japan, and four times the yield of the Tsar Bomba (50 MT), the largest nuclear weapon ever built. The 1883 eruption ejected approximately 21 cubic kilometres (5.0 cu mi) of rock, ash, and pumice,[3] and generated the loudest sound historically reported: the cataclysmic explosion was distinctly heard as far away as Perth in Australia approx. 1,930 miles (3,110 km), and the island of Rodrigues near Mauritius approx. 3,000 miles (5,000 km) distant. Near Krakatoa, according to official records, 165 villages and towns were destroyed and 132 seriously damaged, at least 36,417 (official toll) people died, and many thousands were injured by the eruption, mostly from the tsunamis that followed the explosion. The eruption destroyed two-thirds of the island of Krakatoa.

Eruptions at the volcano since 1927 have built a new island in the same location, named Anak Krakatau (Indonesian: "Child of Krakatoa"). This island currently has a radius of roughly 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) and a high point around 300 metres (980 ft) above sea level, growing 5 metres (16 ft) each year. [1]

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