The Loudest Sound Ever Recorded In Mankind's History - Krakatoa Eruption

Whether you live in the city or the countryside, we all experience different kinds of noise every day. Usually, these sounds are at comfortable intensities that do not harm our hearing. But when they're too noisy, even for a short time, or when they're both noisy and long-lasting, sounds can be dangerous.

Noise is measured in units that we call decibels (dB). Noise above 85 decibels may cause hearing loss, and the amount of damage is linked to both the noise intensity and the exposure duration.

On August 27, 1883, Earth made the loudest noise ever recorded. Emanating from the island of Krakatoa, situated between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia, The eruption was one of the deadliest and most destructive volcanic events in recorded history. The sound could be clearly heard by people across 50 different geological sites around the world.

The explosions were so loud that they were heard 1,300 miles away on Andaman and Nicobar, 2,000 miles away in New Guinea and Western Australia, and 3,000 miles away on the island of Rodrigues, near Mauritius Indian Ocean.

It circled the Earth four times in every direction and shattered the sailor's eardrums forty miles away. This explosion caused a deadly tsunami with waves over a hundred feet (30 meters) in height. As a result, 165 coastal villages and settlements were swept away and destroyed. The official death toll reported by the Dutch authorities was 36,417.

Experts believe that anyone standing within 10 miles of the explosion would be instantly deaf. The sound released from the Krakatoa eruption was estimated to be approximately 310 dB. 

While the loudest sound ever produced by humans, not by natural causes, was the atomic bomb blasts over Nagasaki and Hiroshima. They clocked in about 250 decibels. Eardrums blow between 150 and 160 decibels. That means that Krakatoa volcanic eruption was exponentially higher on the decibel scale than the sound high enough to cause your eardrums to explode literally.

When Krakatoa erupted in 1883, it exploded with such force that it essentially destroyed its island and atoll, released large amounts of sulfur into the atmosphere, and shrouded the entire planet in aerosols that had reduced global temperatures for years. 

At the end of 1927, Krakatoa reawakened, producing steam and debris. Then, at the beginning of 1928, the rim of a new cone appeared above sea level, and within a year, it became a small island. Named Anak Krakatoa ("child of Krakatoa"), the island has continued to grow to an altitude of some 1,000 feet (300 meters) and sometimes erupts.