A Lake that Killed 1,700 People and 3500 livestocks overnight, and the reason still unknown
Photo courtesy U S. Geological Survey Lake Nyos is a crater lake in the northwest region of Cameroon, located about 315 km northwest of Yaounde, the capital. On 21 August night, 1986, one of the strangest and most mysterious natural disasters in history took place at Lake Nyos. The lake released thousands of tonnes of carbon dioxide gas that spread out over the area choking to death around 1700 humans and 3500 livestocks within minutes. Many people were silently asphyxiated in their sleep. When few survivors woke up from suffocating, they found only dead bodies of their kith and kin. Photo courtesy BBC UK Scientists explain that probably a limnic eruption has occurred on that night in Lake Nyos. limnic eruption is a rare type of natural disaster in which carbon dioxide dissolved in the deep lake waters suddenly erupts and forms a gas cloud over the area suffocati