With massive lava flows and immense destructive force, the famous and feared Krakatoa volcano erupted in 1883 creating the modern world's first mega disaster.

Krakatoa is a volcanic island located between Java and Sumatra in the Sundra Strait of Indonesia. Krakatoa mountain has emitted enormous eruptions throughout recorded history but perhaps the best remembered was the 1883 explosion.

Krakatoa measured over 6,000 feet high with a diameter of around 10 miles before one of its most violent volcanic eruptions on 27th August 1883. The explosion blew away the entire cone and two thirds of the island, causing a tidal wave over 140 feet high that carried one ship more than two miles inland. Hot ash rose in a 50-mile high plume and chunks of pumice stone rained down on the surrounding area, some reaching 100 miles away. The city of Jakarta was plunged into total darkness and pyroclastic flow affected the coast of Sumatra and a large area of the Sundra Strait. Over 36,000 people, including many Dutch settlers living in the area, were killed immediately, thousands of people were injured and countries all over the globe were affected.

The August 1883 eruption created the loudest sound in living history, which was heard thousands of miles away, as far afield as Rodrigues Island near Mauritius and Perth in Australia. Concussive airwaves traveled around the world and were still being measured five days after the event. In the year following Krakatoa’s eruption global temperatures fell, due to the sulphur dioxide gas that had been blown in to the stratosphere, and weather patterns became chaotic.

Subsequent eruptions have rebuilt a new island, now known as Anak Krakatoa, or ‘child of Krakatoa, which broke the surface of the sea in August 1930. Since the 1950s the island has grown at an average rate of 13 cm (five inches) per week. Krakatoa is still active and in 1994, its eruption was followed by quiet days and days of continuous eruptions, with some larger explosions. Its most recent eruptions occurred in October and November 2007, with rocks, hot gases and lava emerging from Krakatoa’s cone. Scientists issued a warning for people not to venture closer than three kilometers around the island.