This month two Victoria University experts are visiting Taupo to
speak about supervolcanoes and the discovery of the ancient
Roman city of Pompeii preserved by a volcanic eruption. The
lectures will be presented at the Great Lake Centre, Story
Place, Taupo on Wednesday 30 May from 5.30-8.30pm. Professor
Colin Wilson, from Victorias School of Geography, Environment
and Earth Sciences, studies the volcanoes that produce the
biggest eruptions: supervolcanoes. The most recent eruption from
a supervolcano was in New Zealandat Taupo, about 27,000 years
ago. It ejected 530 cubic kilometres of molten rock and caused
several hundred square kilometres of land to collapse, forming
the hole in which Lake Taupo now sits. In comparison, the
biggest volcanic eruption in recorded historythe 1815 eruption
at Tambora in Indonesiaejected only 50 cubic kilometres of
molten rock, yet the explosion was heard 2,000 kilometres away,
and the eruption and its effects killed at least 71,000 people.
Humanity has never experienced anythi