Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The Mount Tambora Eruption

Episode Date: April 30, 2021

In 1815, one of the most catastrophic and deadly events in recorded human history occurred in Indonesia. A volcanic explosion took place which was larger than anything, any human had ever witnessed in over 10,000 years. The total death toll from the event might have been as high as a quarter-million people. Learn more about the Mount Tambora explosion on this Episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 1815, one of the most catastrophic and deadly events in recorded human history occurred in Indonesia. A volcanic explosion took place, which was larger than anything, any human had ever witnessed in over 10,000 years. The total global death toll from the event may have been as high as the tens of millions. Learn more about the Mount Tambora explosion on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? throughline is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed. It effectively turned day into night and how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the Thurline podcast from NPR.

Hi, I'm Natalie. And I'm Cass. And we're the hosts of shared history. A comedic history podcast exploring the stories of the often overlooked or underrepresented. The people and events your history books may have glossed over, whitewashed, manwashed, or left out completely. From the Mayan creation myth to the deaf president now movement of the 1980s. From ancient scientist Avicenna to first female principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, Wilma Man Killer. If you saw it in a footnote once, or have never heard of it, we are here to share it with you.

Join us in a rotating guest list featuring scholars, writers, teachers, entertainers, entrepreneurs, subject matter experts, and more. Tune into Shared History on Apple Podcast, Stitcher, Spotify, you know the drill. And follow us at Shared Pod on Instagram and Twitter. And as always, share you later. Mount Tambora is located 175 miles east of the island of Bali in Indonesia. Prior to the 1815 explosion, it was one of the tallest mountains in Indonesia at approximately 4,300 meters or 14,100 feet high. For centuries prior, the mountain had been dormant.

However, there's a big difference between a dormant volcano and an extinct volcano. It can be very difficult to tell the difference between the two as a dormant volcano can be inactive for thousands of years before coming back to life. The volcano on the island of Montserrat was considered to be extinct before erupting in 1995, and the four-peaked mountain in Alaska hadn't been active for 10,000 years before it erupted in 2006. Geology was still in its infancy in 1815, so no one was prepared or expected what was about. out to happen. What was happening is that deep below Mount Tambor, a magma chamber had been slowly filling over centuries miles below the surface. The magma chamber was emptied at some point in the distant past and slowly began to refill. When the chamber filled, the pressure inside began to

drastically increase. The first signs that the volcano was coming back to life occurred three years earlier in 1812. The volcano began to rumble and steam started to rise. Things remained at this low level of activity for about three years until April 5th, 1815. On April 5th, a giant explosion took place. The explosion was heard almost a thousand miles away on various islands around the Indonesian archipelago. Many people thought that it sounded like gunfire. This was just the start of would be almost two weeks of continuous eruptions. The next day on April 6th, ash began falling on the eastern side of the Isle of Java. On April 10th, the biggest eruption yet took. place. Witnesses saw three giant plumes of lava that shot up from the volcano, and then

fiery lava began flowing out, covering the entire mountain. Pyroclastic flows of hot gas and volcanic matter came down the side of the mountain at over 100 miles per hour, destroying the village of Tambora. It was like what buried the city of Pompeii in Italy, only hundreds of times greater. The heat of the pyroclastic flows caused winds that were hurricane strength, which uprooted trees. A column of smoke and ash was sent 20,000. miles into the stratosphere. Pummus ejected from the volcano would float on the water and was so thick that ships couldn't leave the port. The explosions continued until April 11th. Ash and pumice continued to be thrown into the sky for another six days. The major activity on the volcano

didn't cease until April 17th, and minor activity continued on Tambora through July. By any measure you choose, the Tambora explosion was the greatest volcanic eruption in at least the last 10,000 years, and maybe even since the mega Mount Toba eruption 70,000 years earlier, which is absolutely going to be a future episode. The eruption devastated the island of Sumbawa where it was located, as well as nearby islands such as Lombok. Sumbawa was covered in a meter and a half of volcanic ash. The forests and crops on the island and many nearby islands were totally destroyed. The explosion on April 10th caused a tsunami that killed thousands on nearby islands. The 14,000-foot volcano had lost nearly 4,000 feet of its height, being reduced to only

9,350 feet tall. To put the Tambor explosion into perspective, it was about 100 times bigger than the Mount St. Helens explosion, and about 10 times bigger than the Cracotoa explosion 68 years later. On the volcanic explosivity index, the Tambora eruption ranked a 7, which is the highest score ever recorded in human history. However, as great as all of the destruction was in the immediate area, it was nothing compared to the long-term effects from the volcano all around the world. As the ash was shot into the upper atmosphere, many of the larger particles quickly fell down. However, finer particles in sulfur dioxide remained in the atmosphere for years. All of that particular matter in the atmosphere was the cause of some spectacular sunsets, as well as dropping the global

temperature several degrees. 1816 became known as the year without a summer, as the world saw its coldest summer in centuries. In Quebec City, for example, they had a foot of snowfall in June. People took out their horse sleighs in New England and used them after the June snowfalls. One person named Faro Chesney of Virginia would later recall, quote, On July 4th, water froze in cisterns and snow fell again, with Independence Day celebrants moving inside churches where hearth fires warmed things a mite. End quote. Frost were reported in Virginia on August 21st and 22nd. In India, it radically affected the monsoon schedule, which resulted in three failed harvest and an outbreak of cholera which spread through much of South and Central Asia. In China, crops died due to extremely late frost and disrupted rain cycles. The global crop failures around the world led to famine. The islands immediately around Tambora suffered famine almost immediately after the eruption, as all the fields were destroyed. and there was no way to get them food given the conditions in the early 19th century.

Their freshwater supplies were also contaminated by the volcano. In Europe, the crop failures led to riots. It was the worst famine of the 19th century and the last great famine to occur in Europe. A typhus outbreak also occurred in many major cities around Europe due to the conditions. In Ireland, it led to an increase in rainfall which flooded the fields and ruined the crop. It rained continuously in Ireland for eight straight weeks. In the United States, it led to failed crops and significant social changes. Farmers out east, dispirited by their crop failures, moved west.

All of the population gains in the state of Vermont since their admission to the Union evaporated as people left. The migration resulted in the creation of the state of Indiana in 1816. It's difficult to pin down the exact impact of the Tambora explosion because of the secondary and tertiary effects of the blast. Famine, social unrest, and pandemics on multiple continents, can all be traced back to Tambora. The death toll has been estimated as high as a quarter million people, but those estimates are only for the immediate impact of the explosion in the area around Indonesia. Once you factor in the other effects of the atmospheric ash from India, China, Europe, and North America,

the death toll is probably in the tens of millions. Oddly enough, even though this is the biggest volcanic eruption in the last 10,000 years, at least, Many people are unaware of it. They are far more familiar with other smaller eruptions like Krakatoa or Pinatubo, mostly because those eruptions occurred in an area with electronic communication and photography. Tambora has been mostly forgotten, even though it was an order of magnitude larger than any other eruption in recent memory. The lesson of Tambora is that something can happen on an unknown island on the other side of the world

that can have dramatic repercussions all over the earth. The associate producer of Everything Everywhere daily is Thor Thompson. If you'd like to support the show, please donate over at patreon.com. There is content only available to supporters, merchandise, and even opportunities for a show producer credit. If you know someone you think would enjoy the show, please share it with them. Also remember, if you leave a five-star review, I'll read your review on the show.