Produced by: Manoj Kumar
In 1831, a massive volcanic eruption cooled the Northern Hemisphere, but its location remained unknown for nearly 200 years.
William Hutchison’s team identified the Zavaritskii volcano on Simushir Island as the culprit by matching volcanic ash from Greenland ice cores to samples from the caldera.
The ash shards’ chemistry revealed a “Plinian eruption” similar to Vesuvius, forming Zavaritskii’s striking caldera.
The eruption spewed enough volcanic material to cool the planet by 1°C, affecting crops and causing famine.
Previous theories blamed eruptions at Babuyan Claro in the Philippines and Graham Island in Sicily, but ash chemistry disproved these.
Remote volcanoes like Zavaritskii evade detection without modern tools, highlighting the 1831 event’s elusive nature.
The Zavaritskii caldera, visible even from space, serves as undeniable proof of the catastrophic eruption.
Hutchison warns that similar remote volcanoes could erupt again, with devastating global consequences.
Published in PNAS, the study urges international collaboration to monitor and prepare for future large-scale eruptions.