Search results for volcano

Archaeologists Excavate a Lost Kingdom Buried Beneath Volcanic Ash

Photo – Pompeii, the Last Days SOURCE Wikipedia Public Domain

from Popular Archaeology

Sat, May 12, 2012

In 1980, people began to take notice when workers from a commercial logging company began dredging up pottery fragments and bones in an area near the little village of Pancasila on the island of Sumbawa, Indonesia. Other locals began finding coins, brassware and charred timber in the same region, all buried beneath a thick layer of volcanic deposits. The finds were not far from the foot of the Tambora volcano, a volcano that, in April of 1815, produced the largest eruption in recorded history. In fact, so intense was the eruption, it’s atmospheric effects influenced weather patterns across faraway Europe and North America. And in one evening alone, it destroyed at least one entire village kingdom near its feet.

Acting on the discovery of these finds in 2004, Volcanologist Haraldur Sigurdsson of the University of Rhode Island began investigating the jungle-shrouded area by using Ground Penetrating Radar. He identified a complete house buried under 2-3 metres of pyroclastic flow and surge deposits. . . . Read Complete Report

Pangean 300 million year old forest discovered in China

from slashgear

, Feb 22nd 2012

This week University of Pennsylvania paleobotanist Hermann Pfefferkorn and colleagues have presented findings they’ve collected from a fossilized forest hidden under a coal mine in China for 300 million years. These findings will lend insight into the ecology and climate from the time and place that the forest was alive, before it was covered in a volcano’s ash over a period of several days. Because of the speed in which the ash fell and the subsequent perfect storm of environmental factors that proceeded, this site has been kept in relatively excellent condition since the age of Pangea. . . . Read Complete report