END OF SUMMER: Future volcanic eruptions ‘could lead to years of winter’

The research by the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Colorado predicts future eruptions will drastically affect global temperatures because of climate change.

And the Earth could be plunged into “years without summer” and endless winters as the oceans’ ability to buffer impacts and moderate temperatures is severely reduced.

The team of researchers from Colorado looked at the cataclysmic eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Tambora in April 1815. 

They found that if a similar eruption occurred in the year 2085, temperatures would plummet and wreak havoc on the earth.

Dr John Fasullo, lead author of the study, said: “We discovered that the oceans play a very large role in moderating, while also lengthening, the surface cooling induced by the 1815 eruption.

“The volcanic kick is just that – it’s a cooling kick that lasts for a year or so.

“But the oceans change the timescale. 

“They act to not only dampen the initial cooling but also to spread it out over several years.”

Mount Tambora’s eruption, led to a huge amount of sulphur dioxide being spewed into the upper atmosphere, where it turned sulphate particles into aerosols.

The light-reflecting aerosols cooled Earth, and led to an extremely cold summer in 1815, across Europe and the northeast of North America.

But the year without a summer was blamed for a poor crop season and and over 100,000 deaths worldwide.

Now there are fears that Mount Tambora’s eruption in 1815 could be a sign of things to come.

Dr Otto-Bliesner, co-author of the study, said: “The response of the climate system to the 1815 eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Tambora gives us a perspective on potential surprises for the future, but with the twist that our climate system may respond much differently.”

Last month, more than 130,000 people fled the region around the Mount Agung volcano on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali, fearing it would erupt.

The volcano was at its highest alert level for a week, sparking the mass exodus.