Novarupta
Novarupta is a
volcano, located on the
Alaskan peninsula, about 290 miles southwest of
Anchorage. Its eruption of
June 6-
June 8,
1912 was ten times more powerful than the
1980
eruption of
Mount St. Helens. Only one eruption in historic
times,
Greece's
Santorini in about 1500 B.C., displaced more
volcanic matter than Novarupta. The
1883 eruption of
Indonesia's
Krakatoa displaced half as much as Novarupta. Novarupta's 1912 eruption has been rated a 6 on the
Volcanic Explosivity Index.
Novarupta sits below Mount Katmai, which collapsed as a result of material being expelled from the volcano. The lava dome that formed to plug the vent from which the eruption occurred is what is now referred to as Novarupta.
Pyroclastic ash flow from the eruption formed what was named
the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes by Robert Griggs, who
explored the volcano's aftermath for the National Geographic Society in 1916.
Katmai National Park and Preserve was formed to protect the area around Novarupta.
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