Thermal anomalies detected by MODIS satellite instruments have occurred at Barren Island from 12 May 2008 through 7 July. Prior to May anomalies had not been recorded since early October 2007. The Indian Coast Guard also reported red glow at night from the central summit area during the second half of June 2008.

Geological Summary. Barren Island, a possession of India in the Andaman Sea about 135 km NE of Port Blair in the Andaman Islands, is the only historically active volcano along the N-S volcanic arc extending between Sumatra and Burma (Myanmar). It is the emergent summit of a volcano that rises from a depth of about 2250 m. The small, uninhabited 3-km-wide island contains a roughly 2-km-wide caldera with walls 250-350 m high. The caldera, which is open to the sea on the west, was created during a major explosive eruption in the late Pleistocene that produced pyroclastic-flow and -surge deposits. Historical eruptions have changed the morphology of the pyroclastic cone in the center of the caldera, and lava flows that fill much of the caldera floor have reached the sea along the western coast.

Sources: D. Chandrasekharam, Dept. Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Hawai'i Institute of Geophysics and Planetology (HIGP) Thermal Alerts Team