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This blog provides a forum for presenting and discussing the latest findings relating to the ancient Indian Ocean, from archaeology, molecular genetics, historical linguistics and other disciplines. It takes a long-term view of the Indian Ocean region, exploring the processes that shaped its cultures, societies and environments from the Pleistocene to the historical period.

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Thursday, 25 November 2010

Giant Eruption Cut Down to Size

More than 2000 times as massive as the blast that ripped open Mount St. Helens in 1980, the Indonesian "super-volcano" Toba ejected millions of metric tons of volcanic ash, sulfur, and other debris into the atmosphere 74,000 years ago. The eruption darkened the skies, cooled the globe by 10˚C for half a decade, and redirected the course of human evolution. At least that's what some climatologists and archeologists have concluded. But a new model indicates that Toba's climate effects were milder and abated quickly, suggesting that humans may have made it through the incident relatively unscathed. Read More

2 comments:

  1. The eruption darkened the skies, cooled the planet by 10˚C for half a decade
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  2. This is scary. thank God i was not born in that era.

    ReplyDelete