Blup Blup Island is a small forested island of the northern coast of Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...

 about 30km offshore from Cape Girgir and is considered part of the Schouten Islands

Schouten Islands (Papua New Guinea)

The Schouten Islands are a group of six small volcanic islands in the province of East Sepik in Papua New Guinea, north of the island of New Guinea. The group is also called Eastern Schouten Islands or Le Maire Islands to separate it from unrelated Schouten Islands in Indonesia...

. It is located at Latitude S 3°30'46" and Longitude E 144°35'16". The island has a small population and is theoretically part of the Papuan province of East Sepik

East Sepik

East Sepik is a province in Papua New Guinea. Its capital is Wewak. East Sepik has an estimated population of 343,180 people and is roughly 42,800 km square in size.-History:...

 although officially it is still a protectorate

Protectorate

In history, the term protectorate has two different meanings. In its earliest inception, which has been adopted by modern international law, it is an autonomous territory that is protected diplomatically or militarily against third parties by a stronger state or entity...

.

The island is volcanic (a stratovolcano

Stratovolcano

A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a tall, conical volcano built up by many layers of hardened lava, tephra, pumice, and volcanic ash. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile and periodic, explosive eruptions...

) and a weak thermal

Thermal

A thermal column is a column of rising air in the lower altitudes of the Earth's atmosphere. Thermals are created by the uneven heating of the Earth's surface from solar radiation, and are an example of convection. The sun warms the ground, which in turn warms the air directly above it...

 area exists on the north west coast. The island is only 3.5km wide with an irregular coastline and ancient lava flows. It is thought that Blup Blup last erupted in the Holocene

Holocene

The Holocene is a geological epoch which began at the end of the Pleistocene and continues to the present. The Holocene is part of the Quaternary period. Its name comes from the Greek words and , meaning "entirely recent"...

. Fresh water is available on the island from wells. Other islands in the vicinity include Kadovar

Kadovar

-Geography:Kadovar is part of the Schouten Islands about 25 km north of the mouth of the Sepik River. Gewai village is near the crater rim. There are no record of historical eruptions and the latest volcanic activity was some heightened thermal phenomena in 1976....

 and Vial Island. There is a small islet about 200m off the south-west shore of the island called Mut Mut where there is a Geodetic

Geodesy

Geodesy , also named geodetics, a branch of earth sciences, is the scientific discipline that deals with the measurement and representation of the Earth, including its gravitational field, in a three-dimensional time-varying space. Geodesists also study geodynamical phenomena such as crustal...

monitoring facility.