The age of the Earth is approximately 4.54 billion years. For all these years, our planet has been a work in progress: water, wind, air pressure, minerals, heat, and even extraterrestrial forces like meteors and comets mold and shape our environment, and created all manner of strange formations. Some of them are really beautiful: we call them “Natural wonders”. Some natural wonders are really famous, for example
Category Archives: Geology
Krakatoa, from space
On August 26-27, 1883, a small island in the Indian Ocean obliterated itself in one the most notorious volcanic eruptions in history. Krakatau (often spelled Krakatoa) erupted with such violence that two-thirds of the island, about 23 square kilometers, sank into the Sunda Strait. The explosions heard in the 1883 eruption remain the loudest noise on human record. The sound was heard across the Indian Ocean, as far away as Rodriguez Island, 4,653 kilometers (2,891 miles) to the west, and Australia, 3,450 kilometers (2,144 miles) to the east. The massive eruption also generated a series of tsunamis, which produced waves as high as 30 meters (98 feet) tall.
