Long Island, Papua New Guinea
Encyclopedia
Long Island is a volcanic island north 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...

. It is separated from the island of New Guinea
New Guinea
New Guinea is the world's second largest island, after Greenland, covering a land area of 786,000 km2. Located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, it lies geographically to the east of the Malay Archipelago, with which it is sometimes included as part of a greater Indo-Australian Archipelago...

 by Vitiaz Strait
Vitiaz Strait
Vitiaz Strait is a strait between New Britain and the Huon Peninsula, northern New Guinea .The Vitiaz Strait was so named by Nicholai Nicholaievich Mikluho-Maklai to commemorate the Russian corvette Vitiaz in which he sailed from October 1870 by way of South America and the Pacific Islands reaching...

.

Geography

Two 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...

es are located on the island: Mount Reaumur and Cerisy Peak. The summit of the volcanic complex collapsed during at least three major explosive eruptions, about 16,000, 4000, and 300 years ago. These produced a large caldera
Caldera
A caldera is a cauldron-like volcanic feature usually formed by the collapse of land following a volcanic eruption, such as the one at Yellowstone National Park in the US. They are sometimes confused with volcanic craters...

 10 x 12.5 km in size, now filled with a crater lake
Crater lake
A crater lake is a lake that forms in a volcanic crater or caldera, such as a maar; less commonly and with lower association to the term a lake may form in an impact crater caused by a meteorite. Sometimes lakes which form inside calderas are called caldera lakes, but often this distinction is not...

, Lake Wisdom. The last eruption was one of the largest in Papua New Guinea's recent history with an estimated air-fall volume in excess of 11 cu km, comparable to the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo
Mount Pinatubo
Mount Pinatubo is an active stratovolcano located on the island of Luzon, near the tripoint of the Philippine provinces of Zambales, Tarlac, and Pampanga. It is located in the Tri-Cabusilan Mountain range separating the west coast of Luzon from the central plains, and is west of the dormant and...

, but the Global Volcanism Program gives a much higher estimate of 30 cu km. This cataclysmic event prompted legends of a "Time of Darkness". The most recent (and a smaller) eruption occurred in 1993.

History

Long Island was charted in 1643 by Abel Tasman
Abel Tasman
Abel Janszoon Tasman was a Dutch seafarer, explorer, and merchant, best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the VOC . His was the first known European expedition to reach the islands of Van Diemen's Land and New Zealand and to sight the Fiji islands...

 but he mistook it for part of the New Guinea mainland.

Long Island was utilised as a barge staging area by the Imperial Japanese during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. On 26 December 1943, D Company of the 592d Engineer Boat and Shore Regiment, 2d Engineer Special Brigade, US Army, landed on Long Island to prepare a radar station as part of the Battle of Cape Gloucester
Battle of Cape Gloucester
The Battle of Cape Gloucester was a battle in the Pacific theater of World War II, which took place between late December 1943 and April 1944, on the island of New Britain, part of the Territory of New Guinea....

. The Royal Australian Air Force
Royal Australian Air Force
The Royal Australian Air Force is the air force branch of the Australian Defence Force. The RAAF was formed in March 1921. It continues the traditions of the Australian Flying Corps , which was formed on 22 October 1912. The RAAF has taken part in many of the 20th century's major conflicts...

 No. 338 Radar Station was set up at Matfum Point and became operational on 6 April 1944 and was to remain until March 1945.

See also

  • List of volcanoes in Papua New Guinea
  • Timetable of major worldwide volcanic eruptions
    Timetable of major worldwide volcanic eruptions
    This article is a list of volcanic eruptions of approximately at least magnitude 6 on the Volcanic Explosivity Index or equivalent sulfur dioxide emission around the Quaternary period. Some cooled the global climate; the extent of this effect depends on the amount of sulfur dioxide emitted...

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