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An examination of thermal areas, Vitu (Garove) Island, August 26-27th, 1954

Created 17/10/2025

Updated 17/10/2025

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No details are available of the previous volcanic activity of Vitu Island, but some old natives have stories of unusual phenomena referable to vulcanism which accompanied a change in sea level many years ago. The inference of the stories was that the change was sudden and accompanied by increased emissions of steam from Zones A and B (of this report). It was impossible to assess from natives interrogated how long ago this occurred, but palms estimated to be about 40 years old grow near the shore in the area to which the stories refer. This area embraces the Catholic Mission, Balangori No. 2 village and Mt. Utopi, and, according to legend, most of the coastal portion to an height of about 300 feet was previously submerged. A more detailed survey of the island would be necessary to establish the veracity of the stories, but there is certainly evidence that portion of the area was submerged. Old oyster shells occur to heights of about 30 feet above sea level attached to basalt cliffs below the Catholic Mission. Since it was necessary for the "Theresa May", on which the writer was travelling, to visit the Vitu Island Group on the return trip from the Langila Crater investigation, the advantage was taken of examining as many thermal areas as possible. Although geysers and fumaroles occur on Narage Island, the northernmost island of the group, it was possible only to examine briefly those areas on Vitu (Garove) Island in the time available.

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Field Value
Title An examination of thermal areas, Vitu (Garove) Island, August 26-27th, 1954
Language eng
Licence Not Specified
Landing Page https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/9f771963-06d6-4b6c-b114-145699490c0b
Contact Point
Geoscience Australia Data
clientservices@ga.gov.au
Reference Period 22/04/2018
Geospatial Coverage
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors
{
  "coordinates": [
    [
      [
        149.4,
        -4.8
      ],
      [
        149.6,
        -4.8
      ],
      [
        149.6,
        -4.6
      ],
      [
        149.4,
        -4.6
      ],
      [
        149.4,
        -4.8
      ]
    ]
  ],
  "type": "Polygon"
}
Data Portal Geoscience Australia

Data Source

This dataset was originally found on Geoscience Australia "An examination of thermal areas, Vitu (Garove) Island, August 26-27th, 1954". Please visit the source to access the original metadata of the dataset:
https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/csw/dataset/an-examination-of-thermal-areas-vitu-garove-island-august-26-27th-1954