The Lake That Warned Nyos

Name: The Lake That Warned Nyos
Genre: Documentary

Two years before Nyos, Lake Monoun released its own lethal gas burst—but its warning remained difficult to decipher.

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Transcript

Lake Monoun experienced a lethal gas burst on August 15th, 1984. The Lake Nyos disaster occurred on August 21st, 1986.
On August 15th, 1984, a lethal gas burst erupted from Lake Monoun.
It killed 37 people, turning Monoun into a warning written in loss.
In this reconstruction, one survivor reacts before the danger can be understood. Stay back. Something is wrong near the water.
The Lake Monoun event was associated with a landslide from the eastern crater rim.
Silence settles, and uncertainty hangs over the dark water.
A warning can be real long before anyone knows how to read it.
The lake's most important evidence was hidden deeper than ordinary sight.
The Lake Nyos disaster and a similar event at Lake Monoun provided new information about possible medical effects.
The Lake Nyos disaster and similar event at Lake Monoun provided new information on possible medical effects of large-scale carbon dioxide emissions.
In 1987, the USGS final report on the Lake Nyos disaster was published. A United States scientific team prepared the report.
William C. Evans was among the report's listed authors.
Lake Monoun waters below 164 feet (50 meters) were anoxic.
A sampling line drops through the boundary into darkness.
Earthquakes and gas-saturated water are thought to increase the chances.
A limnic eruption releases a carbon dioxide cloud from water.
Lake Nyos fills the Nyos maar, a crater set in the southern Cameroon Volcanic Line. The Lake Nyos disaster occurred on August 21st, 1986.

The warning from Lake Monoun had arrived—but at Lake Nyos, carbon dioxide was still accumulating in the deep water.

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