Makian Island in 1903 |
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| Geography | |
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| Archipelago | Maluku Islands |
| Highest elevation | 1,357 m (4,452 ft) |
| Country | |
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Indonesia
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| Province | Maluku |
Makian (also Machian and Pulau Makian) is a volcanic island, one of the Maluku Islands (Maluku Utara administrative division) in Indonesia. It lies near the southern end of a chain of volcanic islands off the western coast of Halmaherato (Halmahera region), to the south of Tidore and to the north of Bacan.[1]
The island is 10 kilometers wide, and its 1357-meter high summit consists of a large 1.5-kilometer wide crater, with a small lake on its Northeast side.[2] There are four parasitic cones on the western slopes of Makian. Makian volcano is also known as Mount Kiebesi (or Kie Besi).
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Makian volcano has had infrequent, but violent eruptions that destroyed villages on the island.
Its first recorded eruption was in the 1550s.[3] The eruptions of July 19, 1646, September 22, 1760 and December 28, 1861 are rated 4 in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History Global Volcanism Program's Large Volcano Explocivity Index.[4] Since the first known eruption in the 1550s, it has erupted seven times, four of which caused fatalities.[5]
The 1760 eruption of the volcano killed about three thousand inhabitants. It erupted in 1890, and was then dormant until July 1988, when a series of eruptions forced the temporary evacuation of the island's entire population, about fifteen thousand people.[6]
Media related to Makian at Wikimedia Commons
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