Volcanic eruptions of VEI 4 since 2000

Map of 20 locations · Worldwide

A dated run of explosive eruptions since 2000 placed at the index level used by volcanologists for events that loft columns into the stratosphere and clear the ground around them. Each is a closed historical episode, pinned at the summit the catalogue records, with the observations drawn from the agencies that logged them as they happened: observatory bulletins, volcanic ash advisory centres, satellite imagery and contemporary reporting.

Places in this collection

  • Ruang, 2024 — Late on the night of 16 April the volcano began a series of explosive eruptions that at times sent plumes of ash and gas into the stratosph…
  • Lewotobi Laki-laki, 2023 — A series of explosive eruptions at the volcano in eastern Flores ran from 23 December into 1 January, beginning with heavy ash clouds that…
  • Fukutoku-Oka-no-Ba, 2021 — A large-scale eruption at the shallow submarine volcano in Japan's Izu-Bonin arc, dated to 12 or 13 August by different accounts, created t…
  • La Soufrière, Saint Vincent, 2020 — Activity at the volcano on the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent began on 27 December 2020 with the slow extrusion of a lava dome. It culmi…
  • Taal, 2020 — A phreatomagmatic eruption from the main crater of the Batangas volcano on the afternoon of 12 January, 43 years after the previous eruptio…
  • Sinabung, 2019 — The North Sumatra volcano erupted on the morning of Tuesday 7 May after about a year of inactivity, its first eruption since May 2018. The…
  • Manam, 2018 — Based on a pilot observation, the Darwin VAAC reported that on 10 June an ash plume from the Papua New Guinea island volcano rose to an alt…
  • Wolf, 2015 — The highest peak in the Galápagos, on the northern part of Isla Isabela, began erupting before dawn on Monday 25 May for the first time in…
  • Calbuco, 2015 — The volcano in southern Chile erupted on a Wednesday for the first time in more than 42 years, billowing a large ash cloud over a sparsely…
  • Kelud, 2014 — The East Java volcano erupted at 23:29 local time on 13 February, producing an ash plume reported at 15 to 40 km and volcanic lightning abo…
  • Sinabung, 2013 — The volcano in Karo district, North Sumatra, erupted before dawn on Sunday 15 September, spewing rocks and red-hot ash onto nearby villages…
  • Nabro, 2011 — Satellite images showed a large eruption shortly after 22:00 UTC on 12 June, close to 01:00 local time on 13 June, in the Southern Red Sea…
  • Grímsvötn, 2011 — Activity is estimated to have begun beneath the glacier at around 17:30 UTC on 21 May, when an intense spike in tremor was detected. The er…
  • Merapi, 2010 — The volcano on the border of Central Java and the Special Region of Yogyakarta erupted three times between 25 and 26 October, and thousands…
  • Eyjafjallajökull, 2010 — Seismic activity that had built since late 2009 culminated on 20 March, when a 500 metre fissure opened in the Fimmvördueháls pass west of…
  • Kasatochi, 2008 — The small island volcano in the central Aleutians erupted violently on 7 and 8 August after an intense period of precursory seismic activit…
  • Okmok, 2008 — In the late morning of 12 July the Alaska Volcano Observatory received an unexpected call from the U.S. Coast Guard reporting an explosive…
  • Chaitén, 2008 — The Chilean volcano entered a new eruptive phase for the first time since around 1640. The Chilean government began evacuating the town of…
  • Reventador, 2002 — The andesitic cone in Ecuador's Eastern Cordillera erupted after a repose of 26 years, with no visual signs of unusual activity beforehand…
  • Ulawun, 2000 — The stratovolcano on New Britain in Papua New Guinea, known locally as The Father, produced explosions, pyroclastic flows and lahars over r…

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