PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109. TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011

Contact: Jim Doyle

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                            December 6, 1993

     A giant volcanic eruption in the South Pacific in the 15th
century that until recently was known only in island legends has
been confirmed by a Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist.

     The powerful eruption broke a big island in half, created a
submerged crater nearly a kilometer (about half a mile) deep, and
interrupted a great battle raging half a world away -- the siege
and fall of Constantinople, said JPL's Dr. Kevin Pang.

     Pang gave an invited presentation on the cataclysmic
eruption at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in
San Francisco.

     Using clues as diverse as growth rings visible in the wood
frames of British portraits and crop records from China, Pang
fixed the year of 1453 as when the legendary volcanic explosion
must have taken place.  

     The new date is much more precise, he said, than previous
ones based on tribal genealogy and carbon dating.

     Pang says he first heard of the legend of the volcano from
scientists studying how the islands of Tongoa and Epi in the New
Hebrides volcanic arc -- about 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles)
east of Australia -- came into being.

     Previously a single island, Tongoa and Epi are now separated
by Kuwae, a submerged crater measuring 12 by 6 by 1 kilometers
(7.5 by 4 by 0.5 miles).  The eruption blew about 40 cubic
kilometers (10 cubic miles) of rock and dust into the atmosphere.

     Pang said such an eruption, equivalent to two million
Hiroshima-type atomic bombs, would have changed the world's
climate.  His research, which delved into records around the
world, proved that to be true.

     In his study, Pang drew on evidence found in tree rings, ice
cores and in the historic records of civilizations in Europe and
China.  Oak panels of contemporary British portraits had
abnormally narrow rings in 1453-55.

     In Sweden, corn tithes fell to zero as the crops failed;
western U.S. bristlecone pines show frost damage in 1453; and the
growth of European and Chinese trees was stunted in 1453-57.

     According to the history of the Ming Dynasty in China in the
spring of 1453, "Nonstop snow damaged wheat crops."  Later that
year, as the dust obscured the sunlight, "Several feet of snow
fell in six provinces; tens of thousands of people froze to
death."

     Early in 1454, "it snowed for 40 days south of the Yangtze
River and countless died of cold and famine."  (That latitude,
running through northern Mexico, normally has much milder
weather.)  Lakes and rivers were frozen, and the Yellow Sea was
icebound out to 20 kilometers (13 miles) from shore.

     "The climatic change was probably global," Pang said. "Large
volcanic acid peaks dated to 1452-60 have been found in Greenland
and Antarctic ice cores."  On the basis of his research, Pang
fixed the eruption as occurring early in 1453.

     The eruption occurred just before the siege of
Constantinople, the last bastion of the once-mighty Byzantine
Empire. The Ottoman Turks, led by Sultan Muhammad II, laid siege
to the city on April 5, 1453, and conquered it on May 29 of that
year.

     Pang said he also finds mention of the volcano's
aftereffects in chronicles of the city's last days.

     Historians noted the city's gardens that spring produced
very little, which Pang attributes to volcanic chill.  On May 25,
a thunderstorm burst on the city:  "It was impossible to stand up
against the hail, and the rain came down in such torrents that
whole streets were flooded," historians noted.

     On the night of May 22, 1453, the moon, symbol of
Constantinople, rose in dark eclipse, fulfilling a prophecy on
the city's demise.  Four days later, the whole city was blotted
out by a thick fog, a condition unknown in that part of the world
in May.

     When the fog lifted that evening, "flames engulfed the dome
of the Hagia Sophia (Church of Santa Sophia), and lights, too,
could be seen from the walls, glimmering in the distant
countryside far behind the Turkish camp (to the west),"
historians noted.

     Residents of the city thought the strange light was due to
reflection from a fire set by the Turkish attackers.  Pang said,
however, such a "fire" was an optical illusion due to the
reflection of intensely red twilight glow by clouds of volcanic
ash high in the atmosphere.  Many such false fire alarms were
reported worldwide after the 1883 Krakatau eruption in Indonesia.

     "I conclude that Kuwae erupted in early 1453," Pang said. 
"The residual volcanic cloud could have made the apocalyptic June
1456 apparition of Halley's Comet look `red' with a `golden'
tail, as reported by contemporary astronomers."

                              #####

Note to Reporters:  From Dec. 4-9 Pang can be reached at (415)
296-8701, and thereafter at (818) 354-3656.

11-18-93 JJD
# 1543