The Lake in Africa That Could Kill Millions Overnight

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]hello wonderful person this is anton and today we're going to be discussing a natural disaster that actually is somewhat scary but not very well known as a matter of fact it's barely known at all it's a natural disaster that only happens around certain types of lakes the bigger and the deeper the lake the more likely it's going to be more destructive and it's a natural disaster that was only officially discovered and confirmed a few decades ago when it did happen in two different cases in africa with media back in the days referring to this as a killer lake disaster but scientifically it's known as limnic eruption and in africa it's also sometimes referred to as mazuku a swahili word meaning evil wind or a wind that kills and that's literally what it is so let's talk a little more about this how it works and more importantly talk about this other lake where this disaster happens every thousand years and is believed could happen any day and so let's start right here a lake in a country of cameroon a lake known as monun a relatively small lake that doesn't look like it has anything special in it and a lake that has a relatively small settlement not so far away from it with what seems to be some sort of volcanic cone not so far from it as well and back in 1984 37 people were found to be essentially dead not so far away from the lake at first it was unclear what happened but it was later discovered that they seemed to have asphyxiated in other words something caused them to die from the lack of oxygen but because of the relatively remote location of the leak at first this was kind of ignored then two years later another event happened in a different location it happened in a much larger league the lake you see right here known as lake nios with pictures like this telling the story approximately 1700 people and 3 000 livestock perished pretty much in just a few hours from what seemed to be extremely similar event events that caused asphyxiation with certain victims living as far as 25 kilometers away from the lake itself and this lake is also in cameroon just a little bit to the northwest of the other lake lake manoun but on top of this there were also signs of a relatively large tsunami over 24 meters in height and so the signs of such huge damage and destruction were very difficult to explain at first but with time the scientists realized that the legend of mazuku might have been true after all the so-called evil wind but what exactly happened and how did all of this work well all of this was due to our friend carbon dioxide a sudden release of co2 from the lake caused a tremendous uplift of water which produced a tsunami released all of the co2 into the air and then caused pretty much most of the animals that use oxygen for breathing to asphyxiate in the vicinity in other words lipnic eruptions are basically a tremendously large amount of carbon dioxide bubbles suddenly leaving the lake and producing all of these effects but because these events are so rare and because they're so sudden and also because co2 is basically invisible to us for the longest time it was actually completely unknown to us and it's only in the last few decades that the scientists started to find signs of these events happening in other lakes with certain signs suggesting that this is actually a pretty common event but only one lake is known to us where this event might strike any time more about this a little bit later first let's actually start with the physics and the mechanics of how all of this works first of all this type of an event is only possible in what's known as the meromictic lake for example in a normal lake or in dynectic lake a lot of the water sort of circulates and mixes with time but in the mirror mythically the water is more still and the mixing does not occur which means that it starts having these layers with certain deposits becoming more prominent at certain depths and because of this these co2 molecules stay in the water and remain dissolved in the water for a very very long time normally they would get mixed around they will get absorbed and released and generally co2 does not actually stay dissolved for a very long time so in a lake where things mix around every season the co2 usually releases as tiny bubbles over time today it's believed that only approximately one out of a thousand leaks is what's known as a mirror mikta lake essentially things don't mix on the inside and you can actually find some of the more well-known lakes in most of the regions in the link in the description for example both canada and the united states have at least a dozen of these lakes somewhere in the region but in order to absorb a lot of co2 the lake also has to be pretty deep it has to have a lot of pressure on the inside for all of the co2 to sink and to then get dissolved inside the lake but once the leak becomes saturated with co2 in a sense it becomes somewhat unstable basically anything can trigger the sudden release of co2 and here the scientists usually compare this to well in some sense this right here huh it didn't produce any bubbles and that's because it's actually really cold if this was a warm coke bottle you would obviously see something like this so because of the change in pressure the co2 starts to come out from the solution from the water solution turning into a gas almost instantly and as you can see in this video right here also disturbing the water to some extent but to start the process just like with me opening the coke bottle it obviously requires some sort of a trigger and in the case of lake nios in 1986 it's believed that it was actually caused by some sort of a landslide although it's also possible that this could be caused by a volcanic eruption some sort of an earthquake or even a disturbance from a rainstorm and as the water starts to get disturbed and as more co2 starts to come out just like with the coke bottle it sort of creates a kind of a chain reaction until all the co2 that's dissolved in the water comes out completely but unlike a coke bottle a typical lake can contain a tremendous amount of dissolved co2 which when released in an area nearby reaches the levels where it actually becomes deadly to most mammals using oxygen for breathing this usually happens when the atmospheric levels of co2 are approximately 10 or so and the co2 in the lake most likely comes from some sort of a underground volcanic activity that over time seeps out a lot of the gases into the lake where it then dissolves over time which is why a lot of these lakes are usually located in the previously volcanically active regions and also why a lot of these lakes normally have a very strange smell somewhat sulfuric smell in the vicinity and the smellier or stinkier it is near the lake the more likely it's going to undergo a limnic eruption sometime soon which takes us to that other lake the lake known as kiva which also happens to be in one of the african countries but this is a much bigger much deeper league and if you actually look around the lake and if you explore some of the sad elements nearby you'll realize that there is a humongous city near it with over 2 million people living in the region and as you've probably guessed by now this lake right here seems to be the highest at risk right now for a limited eruption just like those two other lakes i've mentioned it has all the signs already the smell the tremendous amount of co2 dissolved on the inside and it's also obviously in a volcanically active region moreover some of the studies from the region established that for some reason every thousand years or so there is a lot of sediments involving a lot of mammals suddenly dying with the analysis suggesting that these particular eruptions from this lake happen every thousand years or so and because there were also signs of a lot of vegetation being swept back into the lake it also suggests that these eruptions produce a relatively large tsunami and because this lake is also 1700 times larger than the lake nios where the 1986 eruption happened and because there's an active volcano known as near a gongo volcano located not so far away from here the volcano that erupted back in 2021 all of this of course suggests that this is basically a ticking bomb it's a lake that's potentially going to be erupting anytime soon and because of the amount of people living near it it's going to be a huge disaster but in this case there could be a solution and actually a somewhat ironic solution a solution coming from an energy company the volcano that releases co2 into the leak is also obviously releasing other gases and in this case it releases a lot of methane and so back in 2010 several companies started to extract the methane in the process using it for energy generation purposes but as a lot of the methane comes from deep within the lake at the same time it also releases some of the co2 or basically as you extract the water with methane you also obviously extract the co2 from it as well with the company doing the most extraction right now known as kivawatt but even though this seems to be working for now it's unclear if this is going to be enough to remove all of the co2 that could potentially cause eliminate eruption in other words it might be extending the date for the alumni corruption but it's not reducing the risks completely at the moment the process of removal of methane and co2 is unfortunately not fast enough although obviously by adding more of these power plants not only does it produce more energy but it also reduces the risks quite dramatically and also because this is a relatively recent development it's still not certain if this has any effect on the actual co2 levels deep in the water which unfortunately means that even now luikivo is still a taking time bomb it could create a limnic eruption any time and because of the number of settlements and people living in the vicinity this could be catastrophic it could potentially become the deadliest natural disaster in modern history hopefully it doesn't happen and hopefully the lake does not become the killer lake some scientists are afraid it's going to become but nevertheless it's still interesting to learn a little bit more about this mazuku as it's known in some of the african countries but more importantly to find an actual scientific explanation of how it works and how to prevent it potentially prevent it in the future well for now that's all i wanted to mention check out all the relevant links in the description below subscribe if you do haven't share this with someone who learned about space and sciences and maybe come back tomorrow to learn something else maybe support this channel patreon by joining a channel membership or by buying the wonderful person t-shirt you can find in the description stay wonderful i'll see you tomorrow and as always bye [Music] you