The eruption of Mount Tambora on April 10, 1815, was so powerful that it significantly altered the planet's landscape. It remains the strongest volcanic eruption in recorded history, reaching a 7 on the Volcanic Explosivity Index —a level so rare that it has occurred only a handful of times in the past ten thousand years. The explosion was heard more than 1,600 miles away. For days, ash blotted out the sun across the Indonesian archipelago. Entire villages vanished beneath pyroclastic flows, and