Gamalama

The Gamalama from the sea

Outbreak in 1720

The Gamalama volcano on the volcanic island of Ternate is one of the most active volcanoes in Indonesia. It is located in the province of Maluku Utara in the Moluccas in eastern Indonesia. The Gamalama is part of a series of volcanoes that have formed to the west of the island of Halmahera, including the Gamkonora on the island of Tidore, the Hiri or Makian.

The island of Ternate, 1513 developed by the Portuguese and captured in 1605 by the Dutch, was a major center of the spice trade, so be numerous descriptions of eruptions of Gamalama. For the period 1510-2008 around 60 outbreaks are backed known. According to the census of 2010, the 110 km ² island of about 176,000 inhabitants, of which about 161 300 in the East lived in the town of Ternate and its outskirts.

The Gamalama has three craters towards younger to the north. The outbreaks are usually explosive from the summit craters; but there were also flank eruptions and pyroclastic flows.

During an outbreak, in 1775, around 1,300 people died, in part, by pyroclastic surges that accompanied the emergence of a maar in the north of the island. The maar was formed of Tolire Besar, a lake with approximately 600 meters in diameter and a maximum depth of about 40 meters. With the Tolire Kecil near the Tolire Besar and the Ngade in the south of the island there are two more Maare Ternate, in which there are lakes. The volcanic eruption in February 1840, accompanied by an earthquake that destroyed many buildings on the island or heavily damaged.

In September 1980, some 40,000 fled the then roughly 60,000 islanders to the neighboring island of Tidore after the Gamalama had ejected incandescent tephra and thus triggered forest fires. In the city of Ternate were around 10 centimeters of ash. In October 1980, ended the eruptions. The inhabitants returned; some villages in the north- east of the island were evacuated.

On 9 December 2011, a four kilometers high ash cloud rose to above the Gamalama. Before the eruption of volcanic tremor and an increasing number of earthquakes had been registered so that on December 4, a higher alert level had been proclaimed. On December 27, the mobilized heavy rains ash deposits that flowed down as mud flows, so-called cold lahars, two valleys. Here, four people were killed and dozens injured; many houses were destroyed. In the following months, most recently in October 2012, there were further eruptions.