Sidoarjo mud flow

28 August 2004 (top), November 11, 2008 (middle) and 20 October 2009 (bottom) views of the Sidoarjo mud flow. Red areas indicate vegetation in these NASA ASTER false-color satellite images.

The Sidoarjo mud flow (commonly known as Lumpur Lapindo, wherein lumpur is the Indonesian word for mud) is the result of an erupting mud volcano[1] in the subdistrict of Porong, Sidoarjo in East Java, Indonesia that has been in eruption since May 2006. It is the biggest mud volcano in the world; responsibility for the disaster was assigned to the blowout of a natural gas well drilled by PT Lapindo Brantas,[2] although company officials contend it was caused by a very distant earthquake that occurred in a different province.[3]

At its peak it spewed up to 180,000 cubic metres (6,400,000 cu ft; 240,000 cu yd) of mud per day.[4] By mid August 2011, mud was being discharged at a rate of 10,000 cubic meters (13,000 cu yd) per day, with 15 bubbles around its gushing point. This was a significant decline from the previous year, when mud was being discharged at a rate of 100,000 cubic meters (130,000 cu yd) per day with 320 bubbles around its gushing point.[5] It is expected that the flow will continue for the next 25 to 30 years.[4][6] Although the Sidoarjo mud flow has been contained by levees since November 2008, resultant floodings regularly disrupt local highways and villages, and further breakouts of mud are still possible.[7]

  1. ^ Richard van Noorden (August 30, 2006). "Mud volcano floods Java". [email protected]. Retrieved October 18, 2006.
  2. ^ Tingay, Mark; Heidbach, Oliver; Davies, Richard; Swarbrick, Richard (June 18, 2014), Tingay et al 2008 GEOLOGY Lusi triggering, retrieved October 11, 2021
  3. ^ antaranews.com (March 26, 2007). "Lapindo Tuding Gempa Yogya Penyebab Semburan Lumpur". Antara News. Retrieved October 11, 2021.
  4. ^ a b Davies, Richard J.; Mathias, Simon A.; Swarbrick, Richard E.; Tingay, Mark J. (2011). "Probabilistic longevity estimate for the LUSI mud volcano, East Java". Journal of the Geological Society. 168 (2): 517–523. Bibcode:2011JGSoc.168..517D. doi:10.1144/0016-76492010-129. S2CID 131590325.
  5. ^ "Porong turnpike safe to use during exodus". August 14, 2011.
  6. ^ "Scalding mud volcano 'displacing thousands'". Retrieved June 22, 2009.
  7. ^ Sidoarjo mud flow from NASA's Earth Observatory, posted December 10, 2008. This article incorporates public domain text and images from this NASA webpage.