A new island has emerged in the South Pacific, but mapmakers might want to wait a while before adding it to their global landscape.
That’s because the mile-long landmass that was created by a volcano 40 miles northwest of the Tonga capital of Nuku’alofa could soon disappear.
So said New Zealand volcanologist Nico Fournier, who traveled by boat to within a mile or so of the new island over the weekend.
“It’s quite an exciting site; you get to see the birth of an island,” Nournier said on Wednesday. “Visually it was quite spectacular, but there was no big sound coming with it, no boom. It was a bit eerie.”
The volcano has been erupting in the ocean for a month, and last week it disrupted international air travel to the Pacific archipelago for several days.
Nournier said that the island—1.1 miles by 0.9 miles and rising about 109 yards above the sea—is made mainly of loose volcanic rocks, adding that once the volcano stops erupting, the forces of the ocean will likely erode the island entirely.
He said it would need to be made of lava or something more durable to survive. He also determined that the volcano was releasing mostly steam into the atmosphere and that small amount of ash was rising no more than 1.2 miles.
In the unlikelihood that the volcano somehow makes the island permanent, the naming of the island will be the responsibility of the king of Tonga.
In which case, the mapmakers will need to make a tweak on their maps of the South Pacific region.
PHOTO: New volcanic island off Tonga will likely disappear after volcano stops erupting. CREDIT: Tonga Island Military of Foreign Affairs.
GeoBeats News has a report on the new volcanic island: