India's only live volcano active again after 150 years, say national experts

Panaji: India’s only live volcano in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands which had started showing activity in the year 1991 after being dormant for over 150 years has once again started spewing ash, the researchers at Goa based National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) said on Friday. “The only live volcano in the Andaman and Nicobar islands is erupting once again. The Barren Island volcano, located 140-km north-east of Port Blair, dormant for more than 150 years started erupting in 1991 and has since then shown intermittent activity,” CSIR-NIO said in a statement.

A team of scientists led by Abhay Mudholkar, from CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography (CSIR-NIO) in Goa reported that the volcano is active and spewing smoke and lava once again.

“On the afternoon of January 23, 2017, the scientific team on board CSIR-NIO’s research ship R V Sindhu Sankalp were busy collecting sea floor samples in the Andaman Basin near the Barren volcano when it suddenly started spewing ash,” the NIO has said.

“The team moved about one mile from the volcano and began closely observing it. It was erupting in small episodes lasting about five to ten minutes,” said the release.

During the daytime only ash clouds were observed.

However, after sundown, the team observed red lava fountains spewing from the crater into the atmosphere and hot lava flows streaming down the slopes of the volcano, it said.

NIO has said the volcano was revisited in the early hours of January 26, 2017 again during the second leg of the cruise led by B Nagender Nath, it said, adding the team witnessed the continuation of spurts of blasts and smoke.

“They have sampled the sediments and water in the vicinity of the volcano and recovered coal-like black pyroclastic material representing proximal volcanic ejecta.

Clouds were seen at the crater mouth where the smoke was bellowing out in otherwise clear sky,” the researchers said.