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Report on Nyamulagira (DR Congo) — December 1976


Nyamulagira

Natural Science Event Bulletin, vol. 1, no. 15 (December 1976)
Managing Editor: David Squires.

Nyamulagira (DR Congo) Lava eruption from new SW flank crater on 23 December

Please cite this report as:

Global Volcanism Program, 1976. Report on Nyamulagira (DR Congo) (Squires, D., ed.). Natural Science Event Bulletin, 1:15. Smithsonian Institution. https://doi.org/10.5479/si.GVP.NSEB197612-223020



Nyamulagira

DR Congo

1.408°S, 29.2°E; summit elev. 3058 m

All times are local (unless otherwise noted)


An eruption from a new crater on the SW flank of Nyamuragira began on 23 December. The eruption was not believed to present any danger to life or property.

Geological Summary. Africa's most active volcano, Nyamulagira (also known as Nyamuragira), is a massive high-potassium basaltic shield about 25 km N of Lake Kivu and 13 km NNW of the steep-sided Nyiragongo volcano. The summit is truncated by a small 2 x 2.3 km caldera that has walls up to about 100 m high. Documented eruptions have occurred within the summit caldera, as well as from the numerous flank fissures and cinder cones. A lava lake in the summit crater, active since at least 1921, drained in 1938, at the time of a major flank eruption. Recent lava flows extend down the flanks more than 30 km from the summit as far as Lake Kivu; extensive lava flows from this volcano have covered 1,500 km2 of the western branch of the East African Rift.

Information Contacts: Agence France Presse (AFP); Brussels Domestic News Service (DNS).