NEW-BORN BRITISH ISLAND.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLI, Issue 71, 25 March 1907, Page 2

NEW-BORN BRITISH ISLAND.

VOLCANIC PHENOMENON OFF

BURMA

It is announced in the Gazette that the Admiralty have received information dated December 27, 1006, from the officer in charge of the Marine Survey of India that a volcanic eruption in the form of an island has appeared in the northern approach to Cheduba Strait, off the Burma-Ara-kan coast.

The height of the island, which was first seen on December 15, has been estimated at lHieen feet above high water, and its diameter at about 300 yards

The port officer at Akyab has landed on it, and it is to be examined by the officer^in charge of the Indian Survey. There are numerous islands off the coast of Lower Burma, extending along the east side of the Bay of Bengal, and in the north-west of Cheduba Island there is a so-called volcano, which is really a discharge of inflammable gas. Two other islands—Ramri and Eastern Boronga—are noted for the production of excellent petroleum. . • •. .

Numerous instances are recorded of the appearance and disappearance of volcanic islands. An island, 3000 feet long and 1800 feet wide, which came into existence off the south coast of Japan in November, 1904, gradually subsided, and in seven months had aimost disappeared; while in July last year a submarine eruption threw up an island of seven acres near Boroslar Island, laska, which was similarlythrown up a hundred years previously. Nearer home, Graham Island was thrown up in 1831 in the Mediterranean, some thirty miles from Sicily. It was reduced to a submerged reef in a little more than six months.