Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 February 1914 — VOLCANOES IN ACTION [ARTICLE]

VOLCANOES IN ACTION

-■■ r TERRIFIC DAMAGE DONE WHEN MOUNTAINS BLOW UP.

Long List of Disasters Due to Eruptions—That of Krakatoa in 1883 About the Worst of Which There Is Record.

The eruption of Sakura recalls that of Mount Pelee, which destroyed St. Pierre, Martinique, the most beautiful city in the West Indies, Vith appalling suddenness. Like Sakuri, the volcanic peak of Pelee had been quiescent for a long period, and was her lieved to be practically extinct. It smoked a little for a few days before it blew up, but it had previously sent up similar thin, vaporous clouds at Intervals of ten or twenty years—so nobody paid attention to its seemingly harmless activity. Without warning a. pillar of rock shot upfrom the crater of Mount Pelee to a height of nearly 100 feet, and a rent opened half-way up the mountain’s slope, from which blew a hot blast, stupefying and incinerating every organic thing in the path of its withering breath. In less time, than it takes to tell, St. Pierre, with nearly its entire population, was wiped out and buried in the rain of ashes which followed the explosion. In ijs tremendous force, however, the eruption of Sakura more nearly resembles that of Krakatoa in 1883. This is believed to have been the greatest cataclysmic disturbance suffered by the earth in historic times, and possibly within the more recent of the geologic eras. Krakatoa was a volcanic peak rising 2,000 feet above sea level, in Sunda strait. After warning manifestations, which continued several days, the outburst came on August 27. The entire northern half of the volcano was blown away, and the soundings -subsequently made showed a depth of 1,000 feet of water where the mountain had stood. An eye-witness of some of the prenomena observed from the shore of Java processions of native boats, held by a current many times more irresistible than that of Niagara and sucked into the vortex caused by the great hole torn in the floor of the ocean. It is estimated that the column of stones and ashes thrown up by Krakatoa’s explosion shot up to a height of 17 miles. Nearby islands were covered with volcanic debris to the height of the tree tops of their forests. The dust particles left floating in the upper strata of the atmosphere encompassed the earth as with a belt 75 degrees wide, producing a deep red glow in the sky after sunset for months after the upheaval. On the day of the eruption and for several days thereafter lamps had to be lighted at Batavia at noon. The waves started by the explosion reached almost around the earth. They were distinctly observed at Cape Horn, and were perceptible even in channel. —The most remarkable fact; however, was the distance to which the noise of the explosion traveled. It was audible In the Philippines, 1,400 miles; at Ceylon, 2,000 miles, and in South Australia 2,200 miles away; and a sea captain claims to have distinctly heard it all the way across the Indian ocean off Zanzibar.