2 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 60 



SOME GREAT VOLCANIC OUTBREAKS 

 Captain K. W. Perry, U. S. R. S., reported that on June 6, 191 2, 

 the Revenue Steamer " Manning " being moored at the wharf at St. 

 Paul, Kodiak Island, he observed about 4 o'clock a peculiar looking 

 cloud rising to the southward and westward. Ashes began to fall 

 about 5 p. m., and after this thunder and lightning became very 

 intense and the wireless apparatus refused to work. Volcanic mat- 

 ter continued to fall rapidly until 9 a. m., June 7, when five inches of 

 ashes had fallen. About noon precipitation began again, and by 2 

 o'clock it was pitch dark. Although all ashes of the previous day 

 had been removed, yet the decks, masts, and yards were again heavily 

 laden, and the men stumbled about, colliding with one another in 

 their efforts to free the decks with shovels and streams of water. 

 It was not until 2 p. m., June 8, that the fall of ashes decreased, the 

 sky assumed a reddish color, and finally objects became dimly 

 visible. The average depth of the ashes at Kodiak Island, 100 miles 

 from Mount Katmai, was nearly or quite 1 foot. It seems doubtful, 

 however, if the fall of ashes in other directions from the volcano 

 was as great as in the direction of Kodiak Island. 



It is natural to compare this eruption of Mount Katmai with the 

 extraordinary explosion of Krakatoa in the Strait of Sunda in the 

 year 1883, which formed the subject of the exhaustive report of the 

 Krakatoa Committee of the Royal Society of Great Britain. After 

 a quiescent period of more than 200 years a sharp eruption on the 

 Island of Krakatoa began in May, 1883, and a slight quantity of 

 ash fell as far away as Batavia, Java. Parties landed several times 

 on the island during the summer of 1883, and found much activity 

 there, and destruction of the vegetation. Still nothing very extra- 

 ordinary had occurred until on August 26, when a succession of 

 frightful explosions began, lasting until the morning of the 28th. 

 The most violent occurred on the morning of the 27th, when the 

 northern and lower portion of the Island of Krakatoa was blown 

 away, leaving a vertical cliff. Instead of a mountain 1,400 feet high, 

 which previously existed, there was now left a submarine cavity 

 reaching 1,000 feet below sea level. 



The wave caused by this explosion was upwards of 50 feet deep 

 when it reached the shores of Java and Sumatra, and a Dutch war- 

 ship was carried about 2 miles inland, and left 30 feet above sea 

 level. Nearly 40,000 people perished by the overwhelming of their 

 villages. The wave was still several feet high when it reached the 

 Cape of Good Hope, and was thought to be noted by the tide gauges 



