Despite how much has been learned about the Earth and its more than 1,300 active volcanoes,
several things in the field of volcanology remain a mystery.
The most worrisome of these mysteries revolves around supermassive explosive volcanic eruptions
that ejected so much sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere that the entire planet dramatically
cooled for a time in what is known as a volcanic winter.
While we know which volcanoes caused specific events such as during 1257 and 1815, the location
of which volcanoes created massive eruptions in 535, 540, 1458, and 1808 remain a mystery.
This is a potential problem as if we do not know which volcanoes caused these events,
potentially millions of people could live next to a volcano that is far more dangerous
than is currently modeled and they would never know.
Yet, the effects of these voluminous explosive eruptions span the globe in more ways than
one, such as due to the caldera forming eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815.
Specifically, in 1815 Mount Tambora in Indonesia produced a catastrophic eruption which caused
the previously 4298 meter tall volcano to collapse into a vast caldera, with this eruption
ejecting 120 million metric tons of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere.
This caused worldwide temperatures to drop by 2 degrees Celsius, which while this might
not sound like a lot, simultaneously occurred along with a double digit percentage drop
in solar radiation hitting the ground.
This caused widespread crop failures and famines in China, Europe, and India, causing 100,000
fatalities.
Additionally, when some of these major eruptions occurred, it pushed already strained societies
over the edge, leading to destructive wars.
This is best shown via the 1783 fissure eruption of the Laki vent of the Grimsvotn volcano
in Iceland, which caused widespread crop failures in France, and is today listed as a cause
of the French revolution.
To me, the most interesting of these "mystery eruptions" involves a large scale eruption,
likely twice the magnitude of the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo, which occurred in 1808.
And despite how well documented this time period was, we have absolutely no clue which
volcano produced such a catastrophic eruption, which was probably 20 times larger than the
1980 eruption of Mount Saint Helens.
This eruption ejected 19 million metric tons of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere, causing
worldwide temperatures to drop by 0.8 degrees Celsius.
The best evidence we currently have to work with regarding this mystery are reports that
seemingly indicate that the nation of Peru was the first to see the effects of these
aerosols, meaning whatever source the eruption came from had blown sulfur dioxide in that
direction.
This eruption, which likely occurred on or around December 4th, 1808 thus could have
only occurred in an unpopulated region high in the Andes, or a remote island volcano in
the Pacific such as one candidate I hypothesized which is now a submarine caldera in the nation
of Tonga.
However, Héctor Sacristán recently wrote an article on the volcanocafe website, outlining
a new possible volcano candidate for the 1808 mystery eruption which is strangely quite
plausible.
What I am referring to is a remote volcano with next to no literature about it located
high within the Andes mountain range within the nation of Bolivia.
Known as Tambo Quemado, it is a rhyolitic composition tuff cone.
This tuff cone is massive, measuring nearly 380 meters in height and 6 kilometers in length.
It contains two large explosion craters, the largest of which is 3900 meters long and 100
meters deep.
Based on the appearance of this volcano, it truly does appear that it only erupted once,
meaning everything we see formed as the result of a single massive eruption.
Additionally, gray ash rich dunes surround the volcano, occurring up to a distance of
50 kilometers away.
This volcano is seemingly in the correct position to have produced the sightings in Peru, and
thus might be considered as an 1808 mystery eruption candidate.
Yet, that is where the supporting evidence ends.
Taking into account the size of the tuff cone and the surrounding ash deposits, I estimated
a figure of 16 cubic kilometers for the eruption in question which is a bit too small and sulfur
dioxide poor to have created the 1808 mystery eruption.
Also, by comparing the sheet of pyroclastic material to two other large Holocene explosive
eruptions in the Andes, it appears older than both, suggesting an age older than 2300 BCE.
But most importantly, current evidence suggests that whatever volcano produced a large eruption
in 1808 must have erupted a composition of andesite.
Yet, Tambo Quemado appears to have only ever erupted rhyolite.
So, in my opinion, while Tambo Quemado could have theoretically produced the 1808 mystery
eruption, I consider it far more likely to have produced a VEI 6 eruption in the early
to middle Holocene, so it is probably not the 1808 mystery eruption source.
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