No One Knew It Was A Volcano: The Eruption Of Mount Lamington | Plainly Difficult

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  • @PlainlyDifficult
    @PlainlyDifficult  8 วันที่ผ่านมา +40

    ►Thanks for watching, check out me other bits!
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    ►Sources:
    www.belousov.pro/lamington-jvgr.pdf
    www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv103xdsm.12?seq=2
    www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/j.ctv103xdsm.11.pdf?refreqid=fastly-default%3Acfbbe313e0ba2737bf062282c1dde7cb&ab_segments=&initiator=&acceptTC=1

    • @Asmryourkatnipperscom
      @Asmryourkatnipperscom 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      John, I hope you feel better soon! I appreciate your videos thank you!

    • @zlm001
      @zlm001 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      I'm still not a fan of the panning bulletin board effect you use, at least the way it's being utilized in your videos. There's just way, way to many frames where you can only see a corner of one picture, maybe two pictures, and that's it for a full second or two. I don't think the mostly empty frames adds anything to the emotion, vibe, intrigue, or suspense of the story and video. At least the black frames you used to use added a certain emotional quality and feeling to the video. Staring at the corners of one or two pictures that you can't see for a second simply doesn't add any emotion or suspense to the story. I think you should make the panning faster or put the pictures closer together.

    • @jasonsmith1140
      @jasonsmith1140 5 วันที่ผ่านมา

      John, love your work and look forward to new videos of course. Just saw a clip about the SS Norway boiler explosion while docked in Miami years ago. Have you ever looked into that incident?

    • @zoemillbern4203
      @zoemillbern4203 3 วันที่ผ่านมา

      You may have already heard, but there was a take-off/landing accident in DC over the Potomac River in the US yesterday - currently under NTSB investigation! AA flight and a military Blackhawk helicopter

  • @shafferjoe1962
    @shafferjoe1962 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +301

    Brother you do not have to apologize. You sounded fine and we all love your videos. Get to feeling better and God bless you brother.

    • @PlainlyDifficult
      @PlainlyDifficult  8 วันที่ผ่านมา +34

      Thank you so much

    • @windturbinesyndrome1067
      @windturbinesyndrome1067 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +10

      I give him props for not letting anything stop him from getting a new plainly difficult video out for us.

  • @lauxmyth
    @lauxmyth 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +305

    Well, that is a truck in mid-air up a tree at 9:53. Pyroclastic flows are worse than honey badgers.

    • @Mr.Martin4500
      @Mr.Martin4500 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +25

      I was coming to comment about the truck suspended midair myself.
      It's a snap shot so telling of the horror these poor people must have endured just before their death.

    • @brucetheloon
      @brucetheloon 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +24

      First thing that came to mind when I saw the advice to jump in a jeep and drive away was that was probably the jeep stick in the tree.

    • @lauxmyth
      @lauxmyth 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +22

      @@brucetheloon My memory says there were some people who saw the flow off Mount St Helens and tried to outrun in a Jeep. Well, tried.

    • @LugborG
      @LugborG 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +26

      Pyroclastic Honey Badger...
      I think I know what my next D&D campaign is about.

    • @windturbinesyndrome1067
      @windturbinesyndrome1067 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      Clever comment.

  • @Ancalagon-pr9vl
    @Ancalagon-pr9vl 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +153

    As a rural Australian I'd like to say we love PNG and without them I wouldn't be alive, they saved my my great Grandfather in WW2. But you must realise the astonishing distances in Australia and PNG. I don't have safety for myself in a timely manner where I live, let alone in a remote place in PNG. Responders did what they could.

    • @JustJezBeingJez
      @JustJezBeingJez 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +23

      *PNG is approximately only the size of the state of California however the treacherous mountain terrain and lack of general infrastructure in rural areas does make it difficult to get anywhere in a hurry.

    • @Lynn-r8h
      @Lynn-r8h 5 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

      Side note. Make sure your grandfathers’s experiences are recording either in written or video form.

  • @JGCR59
    @JGCR59 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +120

    Papua New Guinea is still a remote and inacessible area, it must have been extremely difficult to coordinate any relief effort there in the 1950s with infrastructure even less developed than today

  • @kellykane7586
    @kellykane7586 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +922

    Maybe stories of the "oral tradition" type weren't known because their was literally no one left to tell them

    • @PlainlyDifficult
      @PlainlyDifficult  8 วันที่ผ่านมา +226

      Very likely

    • @lauxmyth
      @lauxmyth 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +218

      I am thinking the colonial powers would not listen or value and believe any oral tradition tales even before the eruption. British and Australian authorities just saw local as labour for plantations.

    • @UncleJoeLITE
      @UncleJoeLITE 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +16

      @@kellykane7586 very good point.

    • @thing_under_the_stairs
      @thing_under_the_stairs 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +154

      @@lauxmyth Colonial powers tend to be like that. I just finished reading a fascinating book about how the local Inuit had known the location of the lost Franklin Expedition ships for around 170ish years, but it took until the 2010's for "official" historians to pay any attention. Bloody colonials.

    • @UncleJoeLITE
      @UncleJoeLITE 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +82

      @@lauxmyth FYI, the UK was not involved in Australia investing in & helping PNG transition to nationhood after being invaded by Japan. PNG is still the biggest recipient of our aid. The tired colonial tropes are getting old now. Cheers.

  • @tiberiusgracchus4222
    @tiberiusgracchus4222 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +362

    I'm not a volcanologist and I've never been around an active volcano. But I wouldn't need a learning experience to know that when it starts acting up you get as far the f_ck away from it as you can.

    • @Mrs.LadeyBug
      @Mrs.LadeyBug 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +48

      This is logic that anyone who visits Yellowstone appears to throw away for the sake of curiosity.

    • @blackjed
      @blackjed 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +34

      ​@@Mrs.LadeyBugto be fair, Yellowstone is very misleading in appearance. It isn't a lone peak surrounded by forests. Its the entire area and from the pictures, bloody beautiful. I haven't been but I never heard mention of one volcanic peak.

    • @jamesharmer9293
      @jamesharmer9293 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +18

      Government officials telling everyone that everything's ok is par for the course. That's what they usually do.

    • @Kevin_Rhodes
      @Kevin_Rhodes 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +31

      @@blackjed The whole thing is an enormous volcanic caldera. Not all volcanos form peaks, obviously.

    • @failegion7828
      @failegion7828 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@Mrs.LadeyBug I mean if that ever actually erupts... going to be a really bad time for the Americas and a lot of the world. So why fear something that when it becomes a threat, isn't something you're going to be able to stop anyways?

  • @redditor001
    @redditor001 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +373

    Rule of thumb for any island in the pacific:
    You exist because of volcanoes. Not all of them are extinct.

    • @lorehaziel
      @lorehaziel 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +13

      Not really. The island of New Guinea is a continental island (in this case part of the same shelf of Australia i think), most of those close to the continents are. So, yeah, it is like New Zealand and Tasmania - Not like Hawaii or the Polynesian isles.

    • @TheGhostGuitars
      @TheGhostGuitars 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +24

      ​@@lorehaziel That's true of any midplate islands, like Hawaiʻi. However volcanos also appear on the edges of plate boundaries. Like Mount Saint Helens, Sakurajima in Japan, Toba in Indonesia, and ...Mt. Lamington.

    • @TheGhostGuitars
      @TheGhostGuitars 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +21

      Papua New Guinea may be on the Australian continental plate but it is also on the border between said plate and the Pacific plate. The subduction of the Pacific oceanic plate underneath the Australasian plate is what's driving volcanism in the region, including Tonga.

    • @pepsioverlord
      @pepsioverlord 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

      Majority of our cities in new zealand are built on inactive volcanos

    • @jo2lovid
      @jo2lovid 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +7

      @@lorehaziel The Pacific "Ring of Fire" absolutely includes New Zealand, and many of the south Pacific islands.
      One of the newer pieces of land on earth is from the Tongan submarine volcano Hunga Haʻapai

  • @andrewtaylor940
    @andrewtaylor940 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +73

    Looking at it today, it's hard to imagine just how little we knew about fairly common things like the weather or where volcanos were, until very recently. It cannot be stressed enough just how much Satellites have changed the study of the earth.

    • @subwayfacemelt4325
      @subwayfacemelt4325 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

      And the study of other planets too.

    • @allthingsharbor
      @allthingsharbor 6 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      And we also have now designated, government funded organizations that do nothing but study a particular field of science.

    • @andrewtaylor940
      @andrewtaylor940 6 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @ less than you might think. I mean yes NASA goes back to the 40’s (NACA first), and NOAA was technically formed in 1970 (by Nixon. No less.) US Geological Survey goes back deep into the 19th century. And the US Navy Bureau of Aerology the forerunner of Meteorology was about the same.

    • @Smile200-z4y
      @Smile200-z4y 5 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Us centrism

  • @roger2008100
    @roger2008100 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +120

    The name just rolls off the tongue... best laugh I've had so far this year. May the sun shine on your corner .

    • @christianmallien3123
      @christianmallien3123 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Seriously? That’s the funniest thing?

    • @caittails
      @caittails 3 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      I sincerely hope your year gets substantially better ❤

  • @levanataylor790
    @levanataylor790 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +180

    For those curious, the name of the mountain in the Orokaiva language (accoriding to the PNG national government, which is discussing changing the official name) is Sumbiripa.

    • @RedTail1-1
      @RedTail1-1 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

      No thanks.

    • @PriestessGoat
      @PriestessGoat 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +18

      Oh cool thanks

    • @miapdx503
      @miapdx503 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +28

      Thank you. The colonist mindset has them re-naming every mountain and river there is. Those places have had a name for hundreds of years. The arrogance...😒

    • @flux.aeterna
      @flux.aeterna 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

      Thank you! There has to be more knowledge about the mountain that was lost under the heel of colonialism.

    • @mischavanasperen3063
      @mischavanasperen3063 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

      Sounds a lot better, they should undo this (weird) change.

  • @rrice1705
    @rrice1705 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +64

    Damn, we don't see a 9 on the disaster scale very often. Thanks for the vid, John!

    • @reachandler3655
      @reachandler3655 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

      Let's just hope we never see a 10.

    • @jessbellis9510
      @jessbellis9510 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Nature will always be more destructive than any man-made woopsie.

    • @StrawberryFieldsNIR
      @StrawberryFieldsNIR 5 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      New Zealand does try its best.

    • @elizabethroberts6215
      @elizabethroberts6215 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@reachandler3655 ……the VEI goes to 8. There’re 10 segments’ between each number, so a VEI 8 is 80 segments’ higher than a VEI 1…………

  • @marvindebot3264
    @marvindebot3264 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +165

    Yeah, not one of Australia's finer moments but to be fair this was (and in fact, still is) one of the most unexplored, least understood and isolated places on earth.

    • @JeffBilkins
      @JeffBilkins 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +19

      It is still not doing great. Local problems, outside influences, rights, environment, violence etc.

    • @marvindebot3264
      @marvindebot3264 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

      @@JeffBilkins I know, I was last there two weeks ago.

    • @krissteel4074
      @krissteel4074 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +25

      @@JeffBilkins It's a country like no other, think of somewhere roughly the size of the UK but at every 2nd or 3rd town there's an entirely other ethnic group with their own culture, language and traditions in an extremely mountainous jungle so dense that you can't see much more than 20metres ahead of you in some places.
      I mean a lot of us point and laugh at Europeans being basically ungovernable for the same reasons! Now increase the number of the 'nations' to a bit over 300 and they probably don't like each other most of the time

    • @DaleDix
      @DaleDix 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

      We lost the great emu war. That's embarrassing.

    • @marvindebot3264
      @marvindebot3264 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

      @@DaleDix Hush! We *do not* talk about the Emu War!

  • @just_kos99
    @just_kos99 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +95

    Being a geology geek, imagine my double-delight in a) seeing a new vid from you and b) that it concerns geology. Sad to hear about the lives lost, however.

    • @Hey_MikeZeroEcho22P
      @Hey_MikeZeroEcho22P 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      I hear ya, 'just_kos'...... I, myself, am a Science Teacher in the States....
      Seeing Two (2) tsunami in My life time is More than enough for me........ Interesting, yet Horrifying!!!

    • @Sinc3r3ly
      @Sinc3r3ly 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      As someone whos special interest was volcanones I’m also pretty excited lol

    • @hauntedshadowslegacy2826
      @hauntedshadowslegacy2826 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      Meanwhile, I'm here as a long-time PD fan and also as someone looking for advice on how to hide a volcano from my characters in my book. I've learned more than the average person about geology, but I've still got a lot more I wanna learn before I finish my book, so any additional tips would be greatly appreciated. I've already settled on rhyolite as the main type of rock because of how explosive it tends to be. I'm thinking of including granite and a few kimberlite pipes, too. The volcano in my book hasn't properly erupted in thousands of years because the volcano is under magic control (but those controls have been left unattended for 80 years, meaning the volcano's been unmaintained for 80 years, meaning main character who is the only person who can use the controls has to use them before the volcano erupts). Y'all got any tips or favored resources for me, share away.

    • @josephastier7421
      @josephastier7421 2 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@hauntedshadowslegacy2826 Granite never erupts

  • @chrisross2916
    @chrisross2916 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +18

    Thanks very much, John. I was a child living in Pt Moresby at the time, and while I don't remember the news, I do remember my parents and family talking about it, and that my cousin was flown in as a nurse/assistant to help. Somewhere in the family photos we have a shot of the Jeep in the remains of the tree, but taken from a different angle. Re your pronunciation... I wouldn't worry about it. 😃

  • @peterchenbutterbrot278
    @peterchenbutterbrot278 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +43

    i can hear the town drunk/fool yelling "it's a goddamn vulcano i tell ya!"

  • @jacekatalakis8316
    @jacekatalakis8316 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +107

    I'm adding this to my 'things I am now worried about on vacation' list. Sudden volcanoes, thanks, nature

    • @nlwilson4892
      @nlwilson4892 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +10

      The science of volcanoes has progressed a lot since then. The have a far better understanding of the mechanisms that create volcanic activity so know where the hazard areas are and they are much better at predicting an imminent eruption.

    • @jacekatalakis8316
      @jacekatalakis8316 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +5

      @@nlwilson4892 But it's not perfect,though. Volcanoes have gone up without warning even with modern science however. I'd argue it's about a 98-99% success rate, not 100%

    • @cris_261
      @cris_261 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

      "Sudden Volcanoes" would make a good band name. 😉

    • @mikesmith-po8nd
      @mikesmith-po8nd 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @cris_261
      Or a good name for a well endowed stripper.

    • @RCAvhstape
      @RCAvhstape 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

      Surprise Volcano!

  • @connieembury1
    @connieembury1 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +16

    As I'm suffering through a horrible cold myself I greatly sympathize with you.

    • @Blisscent
      @Blisscent 51 นาทีที่ผ่านมา

      Same. I've been miserable for days! Stupid cold season. Get better soon!

  • @peckishpagan
    @peckishpagan 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +31

    On Saturdays, my husband and I play darts with friends. We wait until the ride home to listen to your video. It’s part of the drive home ritual😊

  • @heidilloyd6721
    @heidilloyd6721 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

    I lived within sight of Mt Lamington in the 70s (near Popondetta) so have some familiarity with this story - but thank you for filling out the details! When I lived there you could still see the smoke coming out to the top - so we knew it was still active, but most didn't have an option to move away! Many staff at a boys boarding school were killed, but fortunately most of the students had returned home for the Christmas holidays, and so were spared. I'm surprised the relief effort was so prompt as when I lived there 25 ish years later, roads and communications were pretty unreliable. I really enjoyed my time there - such an exciting place! Beautiful country, lovely people!

  • @Andy-fd5fg
    @Andy-fd5fg 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +69

    I'd add "Complex System" on the bingo card too.... after all it is a planet we are talking about, a highly complex system containing many variables and mechanisms.

    • @agneskirsch8335
      @agneskirsch8335 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Exactly. Not every volcano who has small eruptions has a plinian or sub plinian eruption immediately after. With no instruments how would they have known?

    • @jessbellis9510
      @jessbellis9510 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@agneskirsch8335 You can study the area for distinct signs of the specific type of eruption even centuries after, provided the area allows for it.

    • @RaglansElectricBaboon
      @RaglansElectricBaboon 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      'Legacy Infrastructure' too. Can't get much older than a mountain!

    • @agneskirsch8335
      @agneskirsch8335 6 วันที่ผ่านมา

      ​@@jessbellis9510There is a volcanic crisis unfolding right now in Ethiopia. They know that there is a magmatic intrusion because of satellite data but geologists have no way of knowing if there is the danger of an eruption because the next seismometer is 200km away. The people of Papua New Guinea didn't even have that.

    • @samarnadra
      @samarnadra 4 วันที่ผ่านมา

      ​@@RaglansElectricBaboon I was going to give it "Legacy infrastructure" for colonialism and blatant racism, but a mountain being old is a good shout too.

  • @justinthomas7222
    @justinthomas7222 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +32

    Wow, I'm kind of a volcano nut, but I've never heard of this one. Thank you, Mr. Difficult!

    • @karlmarxii1898
      @karlmarxii1898 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Looking on Google maps it doesn't look like a volcano still. 70 years ago, there should've been scars but no the location of that mountain on Google maps is a lush forested mountain with no signs of volcanic activity.

    • @theoztreecrasher2647
      @theoztreecrasher2647 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@karlmarxii1898 Volcanic ash is very fertile and up there it rains every afternoon at 4 o'clock. It's the tropics and things green over in no time.

    • @brigittederoch
      @brigittederoch 4 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Did you hear about the 5 specific volcanoes that will erupt? They are Mount Etna, Vesuvius, Mount Marsili, Stromboli Phlegraean Fields. Italy must evacuate!

  • @Kat-tr2ig
    @Kat-tr2ig 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +68

    Plainly Difficult: "Take a look at this photograph."
    Me: LOOK AT THIS PHOTOGRAPH, EVERY TIME I DO IT MAKES ME LAUGH

    • @heikkiremes5661
      @heikkiremes5661 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +11

      Look at this GrAAAaaAph!

    • @piparalegal2019
      @piparalegal2019 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

      Damn it! Now I have that song stuck in my head!

    • @greengreen4616
      @greengreen4616 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

      Do we call it a Nick roll? Happened to me too!

    • @Jimmy_CV
      @Jimmy_CV 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Look at this graaaaaaaph

    • @garnerjoyce606
      @garnerjoyce606 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Help us OUT!, I think they got out, ?

  • @Northern.Town.
    @Northern.Town. 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +35

    Another excellent video that we didn't know anything about until you brought it to light.

  • @doubleducks814
    @doubleducks814 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +28

    If you can smell it, your way,way,way to close. If you can feel it, your way,way, to close.
    If you can hear it, your way to close. If you can see it. Run!

    • @samarnadra
      @samarnadra 4 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      Actually, if you can hear it, you either are literally beyond escape or should probably wear a mask and go inside and seal any drafts until the ashfall stops. There is a weird zone of silence between literally on top of the volcano and quite a ways away. You hear it mentioned a lot in accounts of Mt. St. Helens. Someone bends down to tie their shoe and then the birds go silent so they look up and the sky is totally gray and the mountaintop is gone and what looks like smoke is billowing out. Soon after, ash begins to fall. Then you hear that places much further away heard the eruption. If you can't hear it, maybe you need to run, maybe you need to avoid ash, but you shouldn't be outside at all unless it is in an effort to get as far away as possible as fast as possible, with nose and mouth covered.
      Given the distance from which Mt. Rainier is still visible on a clear day in that area (given Mt. St. Helens is a bit shorter than it used to be) I'd say:
      If a volcano is erupting, and normally on a clear day you could just point to it from an elevated point in your community, or a hypothetical such point if you don't have one, and the wind is blowing your way or might choose to , you need to get inside, block all outside air, and mask up.
      If you have lovely mountain views of it normally, even kinda far ones, GTFO ASAP, wearing a mask - if it is say 10-15 miles away and has a normal sized eruption straight up you should only have to worry about ash, but you never know if it will pull a Mt. St. Helens and erupt out its side or go Plinian.
      If you are in the foothills, you are likely already under an evacuation order, why are you still there, get out and frankly forget about the eruption, drive or even climb to high ground away from the mountain and rivers because your bigger concern is a lahar. If there is a pyroclastic flow you are doomed regardless, sorry.
      If you are on the volcano itself, are you a volcanologist with a deathwish? Go into an old lava tube and pray to anyone and anything you can think of, even inventing deities if you run out. It will at least keep you busy and maybe not panicking while you hope no lava/water/mud flows through that old lava tube, it doesn't collapse, and the pyroclastic flows stay above it long enough for the eruption to pass and you to possibly find a means of escape if you aren't too badly injured.
      I knew my catastrophes class would be useful for something.
      Oh and we all agreed in that class that if Mt. Rainier in particular ever decided to erupt, we were all heading to family or friends to the east, because a lot of us flew over or near Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainier to get home and being college students it made sense to not be a burden on emergency services in the community when we could be a burden on like a second cousin or something. Interestingly, when Mt. St. Helens did get a tiny bit uppity, some of my family back east called me and told me if I ever needed to evacuate due to a volcano I could come there and they would pay my airfare and stay there until we could figure out a flight home later.

  • @elizabethroberts6215
    @elizabethroberts6215 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +6

    ………I remember my parents’ talking about this eruption. They were interested because Dad was in the RAAF, posted in Port Moresby, during WWII. They also helped the Catholic Missions in the-then TPNG, by sending crates’ of tinned fruit, & vegetables, to them. I went onto travelling to TPNG, to Yule Island, Port Moresby, Wewak, & Mt Hagen for work, & holidays’. Loved it all.

  • @scofab
    @scofab 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

    I grew up in the Eastern Highlands of PNG in the 70s~80s. Truly a fascinating place but... dangers abound, take care.
    Thanks as always and regards.

    • @theoztreecrasher2647
      @theoztreecrasher2647 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

      The natives in some areas are still as fond of foreigners as the saltwater crocs are.

  • @Dee-jq2ob
    @Dee-jq2ob 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +20

    I know the mountain I ski on (Mt. Hood) is a dormant volcano and can blow, just like Mt. St. Helens and is always in the back of my mind. Let’s hope people here have learned and will evacuate f it starts to wake up, there’s a huge population up and around the mountain.

    • @miapdx503
      @miapdx503 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      Portland here. I can see Mt. Hood from my balcony, and Mt. Saint Helen from my kitchen window. I love the Pacific Northwest. 🌹

    • @kermitwilson
      @kermitwilson 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Mt Hood is considered an active volcano, as well as Mt Rainier, Adams, St Helens, Glacier Peak, and Baker. Hood is definitely not dormant.

    • @allthingsharbor
      @allthingsharbor 6 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      We stayed one night at Timberline Lodge. The whole time I was having dinner, I was thinking how sad it would be to lose this beautiful structure if (when?) the volcano wakes again.

  • @crimsonnemesis3511
    @crimsonnemesis3511 5 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Thanks!

  • @TheVeganarchism
    @TheVeganarchism 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +14

    I’m not a volcanologist, but when the local jungle-topped mountain starts rumbling and emitting white smoke, I think even I would have figured it out.

  • @jenniferjones755
    @jenniferjones755 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

    I lived in Popendetta in the late 60's, my father was army and I loved it. He was an engineer.

  • @jeffreyhansen2806
    @jeffreyhansen2806 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

    A few years ago, I found a photo showing that jeep up in the tree. It was the first I had heard of the Lamington disaster.

  • @pepsioverlord
    @pepsioverlord 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +21

    Hey plainly! Great Video! If you do another video on volcanos you should make one about the white island tragedy from over here in New Zealand, It was quite an interesting and controversial eruption as they were warned not to go due to the volcano being active

    • @nellinightshade3358
      @nellinightshade3358 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      And burping threatening!!

    • @sonjastarr1364
      @sonjastarr1364 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

      Actually, the tour company was warned but DID NOT warn the tourists. That's the controversy, the company let their customers walk into danger so they wouldn't have to refund any money.

    • @pepsioverlord
      @pepsioverlord 16 ชั่วโมงที่ผ่านมา

      @sonjastarr1364 yep the perfect controversy for a plainly difficult video (maybe even for scandal)

  • @jerrylim6722
    @jerrylim6722 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +56

    the judge bringing his wife, rather than the literal expert they requested, is a prime example why of everyone unanimously hates the government at least to some degree. like... yes, you can have fun... but you could also have fit the volcanologist on the plane too. those two things aren't fking mutually exclusive, yet he just didn't.

    • @melissaharris3389
      @melissaharris3389 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      He also put his wife in danger for their little sightseeing. The volcano could have erupted while they were there!

    • @catprog
      @catprog 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      Was their a volcanologist around who could of gotten onto the plane or would they have need to fly one in?

  • @Ale-bj7nd
    @Ale-bj7nd 3 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    I actually live in a spent volcano caldera. Let's hope it stays quiet.

  • @JosephFuller
    @JosephFuller 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    Get well soon. I've had a hard time with pneumonia over the last couple of months so I can understand the voice issue but I had not noticed until you mentioned it, great job all around.

  • @papabroon7700
    @papabroon7700 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +7

    Good Afternoon from Scotland, I love this channel ❤

  • @bellabale4353
    @bellabale4353 6 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Fantastic documentary! I love being engrossed from start to finish.
    I notice the white and black strip notice when there's a few seconds left till the next the next chapter.
    Always knew when the adverts were coming. 😊❤

  • @TehSmokeyMan
    @TehSmokeyMan 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

    Thamks for still making a video while having that cold... Don't forget your Lemsip😄

  • @eliskytail462
    @eliskytail462 4 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    roomba outro goes hard.
    in all seriousness - thanks for another vid! take care

  • @alexjenner1108
    @alexjenner1108 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

    1:54 The early colonial explorers weren't very imaginative when it comes to names. There must be hundreds of mountains and hills called Mount Albert or Mount Victoria around the world.

  • @codedinfortran
    @codedinfortran 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Another of your videos which is really important for a long-term consideration of hazards.
    I find your content to always be worth watching!

  • @Mr.Martin4500
    @Mr.Martin4500 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +14

    @9:52
    The truck suspended midair
    is a snap shot so telling of the horror these poor people must have endured just before their death.
    This particular photo brought out how destructive this volcanic event was for the people who lived around the base.

  • @Olliethelabradane
    @Olliethelabradane 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    I always enjoy at the end of the videos you always seem to pause to look out the window to check on the current weather.

  • @Alesha_Lewer
    @Alesha_Lewer 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    Thank you for an awesome new video John, as always your videos are incredible. And perfectly timed to go to bed with

  • @matthewcox7985
    @matthewcox7985 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +48

    When a volcano said "WHO'S YOUR PAPUA"

    • @thing_under_the_stairs
      @thing_under_the_stairs 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

      Take my like and get out.

    • @sara.gem.n.L
      @sara.gem.n.L 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      I cackled 😂

    • @sidewinder666666
      @sidewinder666666 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

      I'm probably going to Hell for laughing so hard at that.

    • @scottkraft1062
      @scottkraft1062 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Simple but effective 👌

    • @lenjsun
      @lenjsun 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      Good one! 😅

  • @elizabethroberts6215
    @elizabethroberts6215 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +5

    ………one of my fave hobbies’ is studying Volcanology. Always been interested in Mt Lamington, named after a one-time Governor of Qld, who also had a sponge-chocolate-coconut small cake named after him, too……

    • @garnerjoyce606
      @garnerjoyce606 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Odd, Vikings traveling to volcano after volcano after volcano etc ....

  • @brigidsingleton1596
    @brigidsingleton1596 2 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Get well Soon John.
    Thankyou gor bringing this information to our attention.
    I hadn't heard of it before, but then that 1951 eruption was two years before I was born.

  • @Ghost_Hybrid
    @Ghost_Hybrid 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +13

    I wonder how this eruption compares to the eruption of Mt. St. Hellens in the United States. Also curious if the lessons learned here helped save lives in the latter eruption.

    • @cuddlepaws4423
      @cuddlepaws4423 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

      No, the governor at the time, was significantly absent when St Helen's blew. The evacuation was not held in place and people were allowed to return.

    • @jessbellis9510
      @jessbellis9510 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      @@cuddlepaws4423 Plus people snuck by and ignored the evacuation warnings.

  • @mwheape
    @mwheape 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    This is a great video. It's one of the best. I'll start picking up more of your videos. Fascinating.

  • @Teverell
    @Teverell 5 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    One of the channels I follow is Missionary Bush Pilot, who is based in Papua New Guinea. Those mountains are no joke, and the cloud cover is nothing to be sneezed at, either. Thanks to the terrain, it can take weeks to hike to a village a few miles away, that's only a fifteen minute flight away around the other side of a mountain.

  • @randigo9992
    @randigo9992 5 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

    Most people imagine that volcanoes are dangerous because of lava, but I recently researched about Pyroclastic Flows and they probably are the most dangerous thing about volcanoes, it's deadly gases, hot dense ash and other volcanic materials traveling at high speed, it's absolutely terrifying, I saw videos and photos of it, one video was about people driving away from pyroclastic flow from volcano in Guatemala and it was fast like in some Hollywood disaster movies, and also I saw videos and photos of St Helens eruption, one of them was particularly good, it was made by a reporter who was pretty close to it and everything started to get covered in ash and soon the sky turned almost fully pitch-dark and he was going towards the light but soon last bit of light coming from the sky got covered by ash and everything was absolutely dark and he thought that he would die but he got lucky to get rescued, also there are last photos of photographer who died from the same eruption and he was too close to the St Helens and pyroclastic flow killed him but he covered his camera with his own body because he knew that was going to die. Pyroclastic flows are the most dangerous volcanic phenomenon, you cannot outrun it, it could reach a temperatures of thousand of degrees Celsius, it is impossible to breathe inside, it is an overkill type of weather

    • @SupersuMC
      @SupersuMC 2 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      You can't run from a pyroclastic flow, you can't hide from a pyroclastic flow, your only hope is to be nowhere near a pyroclastic flow.

  • @PeterKelley
    @PeterKelley 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +5

    The reason they keep mentioning the Oro Kaivan people is that Oro province has 2 main people groups: the Oro Kaivan and the coastal people.

  • @Blisscent
    @Blisscent 50 นาทีที่ผ่านมา

    Watching this while not able to sleep because of my own cold. You're more productive than me making a whole video!

  • @jfrancis98
    @jfrancis98 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Congrats on a million subs!! You deserve it. Thank you for your hard work!!

  • @foreverpinkf.7603
    @foreverpinkf.7603 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Never heard of that eruption. Thank you for enlightenment.

  • @beagleissleeping5359
    @beagleissleeping5359 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

    Watched a recent news video with a volcano in Ethiopia. Many people in the comments were saying, "That's not a volcano."
    I'm guessing that if it's not a pointy mountain like in a cartoon, it doesn't count in their minds.

    • @SupersuMC
      @SupersuMC 2 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      The volcano is not the mountain. The volcano is the vent.
      By this logic, any lava springs in Minecraft's Overworld are volcanos and the lava lakes are magma chambers/calderas.

  • @RookwingsKirk
    @RookwingsKirk 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    I hope you feel better soon... Thanks for another fantastic video

  • @Tonedog88
    @Tonedog88 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    New knowledge, for me. Great video. Thanks!

  • @Nick-Rivers
    @Nick-Rivers 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    I very rarely subscribe to any channel, but happily have to yours... Because you actually narrate the video yourself and don't use AI.. and it sounds great.. so glad to hear a real person narrating these types of vids --- so many these days use crappy AI ..

  • @mistyblues6762
    @mistyblues6762 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Thanks for another interesting video, I'd not heard of this disaster before

  • @compugod91
    @compugod91 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    Hey an idea for a video would be the West Valley Demonstration site. It was the USA attempt at reprocessing spent nuclear fuel and through it's entire time in operation it didn't actually have any results other than making a ton of nuclear waste to the point the company in charge just gave up and left it to the state to clean up the mess. I don't believe anyone died but it still has potential to leach radiation to the surrounding creeks in Western New York.

    • @levanataylor790
      @levanataylor790 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      Wow, I just looked that up, it's nuts. The plant (the only commercial nuclear fuel reprocessing facility in US history) operated for just 6 years. The cleanup on the other hand began in 1980 and the DOE expects it will be completed in the 2040s! During its six years it recovered 4,246 lb of plutonium and 1 ton of highly enriched uranium. Not a whole lot given that to operate a reactor for that period of time would have needed something like 200 tons of uranium fuel (can someone check my math?) The operations generated 600,000 gallons of high-level radioactive waste which the company simply left in underground tanks. They also buried other sorts of waste on their property and accepted a bunch from other people for burial. Above-ground facilities have been carefully dismantled and decontaminated so far, but, as of the report from 2023 that I found, the cleanup has yet to tackle the principal tanks and some other underground constructions, and they're still chasing the plume of radioactivity along the groundwater flow. That makes the putative 2043 completion date sound kind of optimistic.

  • @eb-sj
    @eb-sj 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    The perfect way to end the night!! A little plainly difficult before bed 😌

  • @annisrodoria4951
    @annisrodoria4951 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    I have the cold too started today. John get well soon from the US

  • @giajensen1689
    @giajensen1689 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Get well soon John!❤🇸🇪

  • @cadillacdeville5828
    @cadillacdeville5828 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +8

    Yippee! Good morning 🌞 Plainly Difficult and Saturday morning fans!

  • @Onora619
    @Onora619 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +13

    You can see why people believed in gods/spirits controlling the weather/nature.

    • @CantHandleThisCanYa
      @CantHandleThisCanYa 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      Because they did not know any better. Ignorance is never a justification to believe in something wholly unsubstantiated.

    • @rubelan3552
      @rubelan3552 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      @@CantHandleThisCanYa We do now, and even those who reach way further than most in scientific value still manage to hold a belief system, why?

    • @andymalish9943
      @andymalish9943 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      No,no,no the Gods don't control the weather. Everyone knows that job falls on the government.

  • @janwitts2688
    @janwitts2688 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +9

    The ineffectiveness of the pre disaster preparations....
    Err.. like basicly zero preparations...

    • @allangibson8494
      @allangibson8494 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      Australia isn’t exactly known for volcanoes…
      And communications in this area still aren’t great.

  • @TrineDaely
    @TrineDaely 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    I hope you're feeling better soon John!

  • @jasontempest4233
    @jasontempest4233 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    I live in Cairns, which is the closest Australian city to PNG so we have a lot of PNG nationals living here. What I find amazing, even in modern times is that often disasters happen in PNG and the Australian media makes little mention of it, for instance the recent Kaokalam landslide in May 2024, which killed 162 people. We heard nothing of that until months later when people started posting on TH-cam. Another landslide in Leyte in 2006 killed 1,126 people.
    Another big disaster that hardly got a mention was the July 1998 Aitape Tsunami' which killed between 2000 and 3000 people. There is some conjecture to the actual number.
    This Lamington volcano disaster is one that I haven't even heard about and yet it was technically part of Australia when it happened.
    PNG is one of the most understated countries on Earth. There is even evidence that formal Agriculture in the New Guinea highland actually began prior to Mesopotamia or the Indus Valley and the Banana we take for granted was first domesticated in the New Guinea highlands.

  • @susanlansdell863
    @susanlansdell863 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Hope you’re feeling better soon John.xx

  • @mlbalan74
    @mlbalan74 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +7

    Wow! I was just reading about this mountain on Monday. I had never heard of it before. Thanks for the video! (I’m also on this less than an hour after posting for once!)

  • @rcwagon
    @rcwagon 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    10:00 You mentioned that the Kokoda trail linked Popendeta (spelling?) with Port Moresby. That is truly the weakest link. It is a very tough hike at best.

  • @ElizabethBeaver
    @ElizabethBeaver วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    mr. music supplied a great one this time!

  • @TacComControl
    @TacComControl 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    Video opens: "Take a look at this photograph"
    Me: "Every time I do it makes me laugh..."

  • @GarGhuul
    @GarGhuul 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    I hope you feel better soon.

  • @Rambogner
    @Rambogner 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    This is bound to be an EXPLOSIVE episode

  • @HogMan2022
    @HogMan2022 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Great video,Sir! 🙋🇺🇲

  • @donQpublic
    @donQpublic 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Good job John!

  • @Electriceye1984bySam
    @Electriceye1984bySam 5 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Great vid, thanks!

  • @thetangieman3426
    @thetangieman3426 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Thanks!!! Don't worry about your voice quality, I'm pretty sure everyone in the Northern Hemisphere is going through it right now.

  • @EthanTheWerewolf
    @EthanTheWerewolf 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Amazing video as always! I hope you get feeling better! I recommend a nice cup of tea with honey in it, unless you are allergic to honey then skip that step

  • @margaretf667
    @margaretf667 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Just got my power and Internet back, yay your video!

  • @carolmartin7042
    @carolmartin7042 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Thanks for that video. Learned something. Chief

  • @craigthescott5074
    @craigthescott5074 7 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    I’ve looked into the crater of MT Vesuvius and it was smoking and steaming and I told my wife we better not hang out here too long. 😅

  • @Jimmy_CV
    @Jimmy_CV 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

    "Take a look at this photograph." Every time I do it makes me laugh...oh wait this is plainly difficult o.o

  • @PXAbstraction
    @PXAbstraction 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    0:01 LOOK AT THIS PHOTOOOGRAAAPH!

    • @RedTail1-1
      @RedTail1-1 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      The a is drawn out not the o

    • @PXAbstraction
      @PXAbstraction 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

      @RedTail1-1 You are correct. I should know better. I will correct.

  • @HIHI-tr8xx
    @HIHI-tr8xx 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Hell yea new Plainly Difficult video droped

  • @deano1873
    @deano1873 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    I think around an eruption in the past 10,000 years classes it as active. Predicting eruptions on volcanoes is difficult even in modern times. Most modern volcanoes regularly vent without going any further. Waking up and going bang is rare, but with the forces involved can be quite significant.... by the way I've found jungle covered volcanoes that locals call 'Mt Fire', so oral traditions can go back a fair way in time.

  • @aurtisanminer2827
    @aurtisanminer2827 4 วันที่ผ่านมา

    6:33. I know that feeling at the moment.

  • @ellenbryn
    @ellenbryn 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Tragic and interesting. I've been fascinated by and studied St Helens all my life, since it happened when I was 9, yet I've never seen this eruption mentioned despite being just a generation earlier. It speaks to the way information used to be siloed before the internet, because it's pretty clear from photos and description Lamington had a similar sideways crater wall collapse directing a lot of the initial pyroclastic surge in one direction, although not quite as exclusively as St. Helens did with its opening landslide acting like a thumb over a spraying bottle of champagne.
    The lahar hazard (river overflowing its banks from the buildup of volcanic ash and debris) really should have been foreseen. I'm surprised the indigenous population didn't complain about where they were being settled - although they may have done, of course, and been ignored - since while they didn't know this was an active volcano, they had others in the region and were surely more familiar with such hazards than the Europeans.
    Then again, Christian missionaries tend to efface the oral traditions about gods and supernatural beings in which lore about earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes tends to be coded. Or the elders who passed down such information may have been wiped out by smallpox and other diseases brought by white settlers or the eruption itself.
    Those native populations that have managed to preserve oral traditions are now combing them for records of geologic and meteorologic events prior to European contact. The Cascadia megathrust earthquake of 1700 is preserved in oral traditions of American NW peoples, and volcanologist Don Swanson hws done some really fascinating research on the pre-contact eruptive history of Kilauea Volcano correlating drill cores (which offer only a scattershot record, because that volcano is constantly resurfacing itself on one side or another with new flows) with stories of an earlier phase when it was more explosive like Lamington and Merapi instead of the lava flow queen like Iceland it is now.

  • @SabreKai-u8i
    @SabreKai-u8i 6 วันที่ผ่านมา

    The audio came across as very clear. Once again a very interesting story. I've been watching your channel now for at least 3 years now, and love them. Especially the ones about radioactive accidents. Keep up the great work.

  • @321ozzy
    @321ozzy 6 วันที่ผ่านมา +1

    I appreciate using your own voice, instead of the numorous voice-overs that make a video impersonal.

  • @SomeIdiot983
    @SomeIdiot983 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    Feel better soon

  • @alextaylor9778
    @alextaylor9778 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

    While on the topic of Australia.
    Have a look at the Grenville train disaster outside Sydney. One of the most well known train accident in Australian history.

  • @miapdx503
    @miapdx503 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +4

    We're all one natural disaster away from being homeless. Remember that the next time you find yourself judging people.

  • @edbruder9975
    @edbruder9975 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    Why does it say Eat Me at 2:00 while he says Mount Victory?

  • @JGCR59
    @JGCR59 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

    The plane (VH-AIA) Tailor used was also a De Havilland Dragon Rapide

  • @ex-navyspook
    @ex-navyspook 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

    1:23 Wow, after watching the "World War 2" channel's extensive coverage of the Papua-New Guinea campaign, I know this map pretty well, now.

    • @philipbrening433
      @philipbrening433 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +2

      My next door neighbor is a WWII veteran who was at Buna Gona and that's where he got malaria 😮

    • @ex-navyspook
      @ex-navyspook 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @philipbrening433 Lots of them did. A friend of mine was on "The Track," got malaria, and was never able to quite shake it. Eventually died because of complications related to the condition in his later years.

    • @philipbrening433
      @philipbrening433 7 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@ex-navyspook my next door neighbor is still alive

  • @kingbadmovie
    @kingbadmovie 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +40

    Missed a perfect opportunity to start the video with a Nickelback reference.

    • @orektez
      @orektez 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +3

      what's nickelback?

    • @thing_under_the_stairs
      @thing_under_the_stairs 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +14

      There is never a good time for a Nickelback reference.

    • @kingbadmovie
      @kingbadmovie 8 วันที่ผ่านมา

      @@thing_under_the_stairs
      🎶 Look at this photograph
      This story will not make you laugh. 🎶

    • @thing_under_the_stairs
      @thing_under_the_stairs 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +11

      @@orektez Keep your blissful ignorance.

    • @ZoeCalico
      @ZoeCalico 8 วันที่ผ่านมา +16

      It happened in my head, anyway. Especially since that "Look at this graph" vine whipped into my algorithm out of nowhere like 8 hours ago