VOLCANO

NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION * * * VOLCANO Group: SMILE Class: I4A Members of group: 1. Tran Thao Anh 2. Trinh Thi Van Anh 3. Mac Quoc Cuong February 18 th , 2009 Annual, there are many natural disasters have been happening and threatening human life. For example: storm, flood, typhoon, earthquake, tornado, tsunami, volcano…. In those, we are not impossible to mention about volcano – one of the most dangerous natural disaster. However, how much do you know about volcano? Certainly, all of you also know the consequences which the volcano has been causing. But have you ever imagine that one volcano can even destroy everything of a country and make it completely disappear is one of new seven wonders in the world? Maybe until now, you are very curious about this volcano and there are many question in your mind such as: What is it? How did it form? What is the history of eruption? Or how did it damage? Now to answer these questions, we temporarily call it is a mystery and let discover the mystery with us! Firstly, we will go to answer the questions: What is it? What is the mystery? And the answer is Vesuvius volcano, which is known as one of the most dangerous volcano in the world with horrible disaster in human history. Having a connection with the origin of its name, there are some of theories. But nowadays, people think that the most reliable theory is the name base on son’s name of the Greek god Zeus and the Queen Alcmene of Thebes is Heracles. Vesuvius located in province of Naples, Italy. The height of it has been changed by time but now it is 1,282 meters. And the type of the volcano is stratovolcano. This volcano started forming around 17,000 or 18,300 years ago. It’s a distinctive “ humpacked “mountain, consisting of a large cone. The mountain is made up by layer of lava, scoria, volcanic ash and pumice. About how it was formed, it was formed as a result of the collision of two tectonics plates, the African and the Eruasian. The former was pushed beneath the latter, deeper into the earth. The crust material became heated until it melted, forming magma, a type of liquid rock. Because the magma is less dense than the solid rock around the volcano. It is pushed upward and when it finds a weak place at the Earth’s surface it will break through, producing the volcano. 2 After searching about general information about Vesuvius volcano, we are wavering about the history of it. How many times did it erupt? What is the process of eruption and were there any special things beside these eruptions? Versifies is the only volcano on the European mainland to have erupted within the last hundred years. Although it is not currently erupting, it erupted so many times. The period of Vesuvius eruption can be separate into four parts: • Before 79AD: In this time, some small eruptions happened to form the caldera: + The Basal Pumice eruptions, 18,300 years ago: It was the biggest and the most violent eruption before 79AD. It was also thought is the main reason of the original forming Somma caldera. + The Green Pumice eruption, 6000 years ago. + The Mercato eruption, 8000 years ago + The Avellino eruption 1600BC. This eruption was apparently two km west of the current crater and it destroyed several Bronze Age settlements After that, the volcano then entered a stage of more frequent but it less violent than before until the eruption in 79 AD • In 79AD: In 79AD, after a long time slumber, the volcano woke up with terrifying power in an eruption that buried several Roman towns such as: Pompeii and Herculaneum under several of ash. This eruption was preceded by a powerful earthquake seventeen year ago on 5 February 62, which caused widespread destruction around the Bay of Naples, and 3 particularly to Pompeii. The eruption of Vesuvius on 24 and 25 August, 79AD has 2 phases: A plinian eruption that lasted eighteen to twenty hours. It built up to depths of 2.8 meters at Pompeii. The second phase was concentrated to the west and northwest. • Between 79AD and 1631: After the eruption in 79AD, Vesuvius had erupted three times are: in 203, 472, 502 and a series of small. There was not any eruption occurred on Vesuvius until 1631, it erupted again. It occurred after 131 years of quiescence. Several months before the beginning of the eruption, people who live near the volcano felt some earthquakes but they did not scared because earthquakes from the land nearby this volcano were often felt. However, the seismic activity became severe in few days before the eruption. As the result, a strong eruption exploded in two nights on 15 and 16 December of 1631. After this eruption, there were approximately three thousand people were killed. It was an extremely disaster for the people who live there. 4 • From 1631 to present: In this period, there were about more than twenty eruptions occurred but only some eruption was major such as in, the others was not too big or had a bad consequence for this area. These are some important eruption: + In 1872, Vesuvius volcano had erupted. As the result of this event, the cone of this mountain was elevated more than before. It was about 1335m. + In 1905, after 33 years in silence, the volcano erupted again with slow lava effusion. + Only one year after the eruption, on 7 April 1906 not only had the eruption with strong lava fountain but also had the earthquake. About 100 people were killed because of this. + In June 1929, major lava flew outside the caldera and made one village in the east slope of the volcano. + On 6 January, lava flows in the volcano spread outside and stopped on 23 February. Then it happened again on 13 March. After that, some small eruption occurred until the main eruption took place on 18 March 1994. 5 • Now and the future: Since the explosion in 1944 until now, the Vesuvius volcano has not worked. However, according to the scientists, this volcano can act again with the high percentage. However, it is just in calculation, we cannot certain anything. Nowadays, the area around the Vesuvius is a national park, which is opened for the visitors every year. 6 Finally is about how it damaged. During the process of activity, there were many eruptions, which caused serious damages about human and property. Such as: + kill and injure many people + destroy many infrastructures, houses + make the environment pollute + Affect the health of the people about mental + Destroy the living environment of many animals and plants In these eruptions, we mention of two important eruptions in historical eruption of Vesuvius. First is the most famous and dangerous eruption which made a city disappear. It was the eruption in 79 AD (is also known as the 79 eruption). It lasted about 19 hours, released about 4 cubic kilometers of ash and rock over a wide area to the south and southeast of the crater, with about 3 meters of tephra falling on Pompeii. The city was buried in fine ash and pyroclastic deposits. The damage of the eruption is very terrible. Estimates of the population of Pompeii range from 10,000 to 25,000 and Herculaneum is thought to have a population of about 5000. It is not known how many people the eruption kill, although around 1,150 remains of bodies in the ash deposits- have been recovered in and around Pompeii. Even they found many remain of bodies inside the houses where maybe the safest is. Pompeii was never rebuilt, it completely disappeared. Second is the largest explosive eruption, which occurred after 131 years of quiescence. It started in the night between 15 and 16 December of 1631 and lasted two days. Although the volcano erupted again after a long time, the damage was not small. Three miles outside Naples, toward Ottaviano, all the country was covered by ash even there has not any plant can exist. Almost lands and houses in the neighbour countries were destroyed. Everything around Vesuvius was destroyed by the pyroclastic flows. It caused not only the material damage but also the human damage. There were about 4000 people died and a plenty of people were injured. 7 This is just one volcano; it can also cause much more serious damage. So, with about over 550 volcanoes in the world, how frightful damage can it cause? There are many different consequences that volcano can cause. According to researchers, volcano is one of the reasons that made dinosaur extinct and causes many other natural disasters such as tsunami, earthquake…Near by, American scientists searched and came to the conclusion that volcano is one of the factors that causes EL Nino phenomenon. And there still have many damages that we cannot estimate. To help you understand clearly about the level of danger of volcano. We will give you some following specific data: In 2000, scientists estimated that volcano caused disaster for at least 500 million people; it is tantamount to the total population in the world in 17 th century. Within 500 years, there were at least 300,000 people were lost their life. From 1980 to 1990, the eruptions of volcano lost at least 26,000 person’s life. What a huge number! . Under the present circumstances, the problem is how to repair the damage which the volcano has been causing? The scientists and authorities searched and found out three basic and necessary solutions to this problem: Firstly, they should invest more modern machine to improve and develop the prediction to help the scientists predict the most correct time when the volcano will work again. 8 Secondly is about evacuation, Authorities should carry out as much as possible practices to evacuate people to safe place. To do that they must prepare as well as possible places, transports and calculate all the circumstance can happen to find the good project to help the people evacuate. In the fact, scientist researched and then divided area around the volcano into three parts with different levels of danger. The most dangerous part has the population about 560,000 people. In addition, they also made many plan to evacuate all of the inhabitants live in the dangerous parts. Until now, there have had many evacuation happened but we can foretell everything. Finally, besides these solutions, the authorities should spend a part of money helping victims and their families. The question is created that what will they do for the victims? They should immediately survey to have a thorough grasp of the healthy situation of the victims. Dividing them to know who need to help first and how to help. Then, they need timely take care and cure victims who are injured and gotten into a state of panic. During this time, they should make victims and their families feel that the situation is controlled. After all, they need sum up what they did, share their experiences, find out difficlties and problems. From there, we can learn the relevant lessons to make it better and better. Certainly, after this report, we found many interesting things around this volcano. It not only helps us broaden our knowledge but also makes us realize the serious damages that volcano can bring to our life. From that time, we recognize the important of protecting human life and living environment of mankind as well as innocent animals. 9 Sources: INTERNET 1.General information about the origin, formation, history, damage of eruption in 79AD http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vesuvius 2. One of the damages: http://vietbao.vn/Khoa-hoc/Nui-lua-la-thu-pham-gay-nen-hien-tuong-El- Nino/20038367/188/ 3. One of the suggestions of solutions: http://www.ykhoanet.com/yhocphothong/tamthan/tamthan11.htm 4. Data about the damage: http://vi.wikipedia.org/wiki/N%C3%BAi_l%E1%BB%ADa 5. History and eruption: http://www.vesuvioinrete.it/e_storia.htm 6. The number of volcano in the world http://my.opera.com/dialygovap/blog/2007/07/01/18 10 . know about volcano? Certainly, all of you also know the consequences which the volcano has been causing. But have you ever imagine that one volcano can. changed by time but now it is 1,282 meters. And the type of the volcano is stratovolcano. This volcano started forming around 17,000 or 18,300 years ago. It’s