Most of the victims perished from suffocation and burns that scorched their skin and lungs. One wall of the Étang Sec crater collapsed and propelled a mass of boiling water and mud (a The next day, at about 02:00, loud sounds were heard from within the depths of the mountain. Geologists had only a rudimentary understanding of volcanology at the time, based almost entirely on the historical eruptions of Italy’s Mount Vesuvius, according to the French geologist Jean-Claude Tanguy. On May 6, blue flames heralded the arrival of magma in the crater as a lava dome poked above its rim. Lightning laced the eruption clouds and trade … “Everybody is afraid that the volcano has taken into its head to burst forth and destroy the whole island.”In fact, on May 5, events took a deadly turn when a massive lahar broke through the crater wall and came screaming down the Rivière Blanche at speeds topping 100 kilometers per hour. Remains of the Paléo-Pelée cone are still visible at the northern view at the volcano today.
I felt a terrible wind blowing, the earth began to tremble, and the sky suddenly became dark. But, as far as the residents of St. Pierre knew, Mount Pelée was a gentle giant. The debris then spilled into the ocean, producing a 3-meter-high tsunami that inundated St. Pierre.Perhaps most horrifying of all, though, was the plague of insects and snakes that slithered down from the mountain, disturbed by its paroxysms. The next morning, residents found birds that had plummeted from the air, weighted down by ash, and a steamer captain noticed dead fish floating in the sea, possibly killed by the shockwave of a submarine earthquake.Over the following days, the mountain continued to fume, driving terrified people from the countryside into St. Pierre, which the newspapers reported was safe. The ash cloud was so dense that the coastal boats feared navigating through it. A devastating mixture of mud and hot water, the slide destroyed a sugar processing plant on the coast, killing almost two dozen people. On 12 May, US president On 20 May 1902, a second eruption similar to the first one in both type and force obliterated what was left of Saint-Pierre, killing 2000 rescuers, engineers, and mariners bringing supplies to the island.The study of the causes of the disaster marked the beginning of modern The destruction caused by the 1902 eruption was quickly publicized by recent modern means of communication. Only two survived within the city, along with a few tens of people caught within the margins of the cloud. A ground-hugging cloud of incandescent lava particles suspended by searing turbulent gases moved at hurricane speed down the southwest flank of the volcano, reaching Saint-Pierre at 8:02 a.m. In the village of Carbet, shielded from the fiery cloud by a high promontory at the southern end of the city, were more victims, also badly burned; few of these lived longer than a few hours.The area of devastation covered about eight square miles.
In a The catastrophe led geologists to invent a term for the blast that destroyed the city. However, the most obvious sign of the volcano’s ongoing activity was the obelisk-shaped lava dome that had begun to rise vigorously from the caldera.“None of the grand scenes of nature which I had before seen — the Matterhorn, the Domes of the Yosemite, the colossus of Popocatépetl soaring above the shoulder of Iztaccihuatl, or the Grand Cañon of the Colorado — impressed me to the extent that did the view of Pelée’s tower,” wrote Angelo Heilprin in 1904. On May 20, another nuée ardente engulfed the ruins of St. Pierre, and on Aug. 30, an eruption destroyed the village of Morne Rouge, killing another 1,000 to 1,500 people.