My latest trip to the E. Java mud volcano called Lusi turned out to be an adventure in contradictions.The largest known disaster ever caused by a mud volcano turned out to be a peaceful, steaming lake.

That is - if one forgets about the 19-me-ter deep mud closer to the main 50-meter wide crack leading straight into the abyss.         And then there are the four sunken villages and tens of thousands of refugees.

The nearby Porong River, so vigorously protected by organizations of various shades of green, turned out to be a narrow, muddy drain dug under the order of the former Dutch colonizers.  

New Scientists Magazine
Indonesian mud volcano may not be Man-made
Michael Reilly

It was billed as one of the biggest drilling disasters in recent history. Yet now it seems we were too quick to point the finger.

On 29 May 2006, a mud volcano erupted near the village of Sidoarjo on Java, Indonesia. Thousands were evacuated as boiling mud-engulfed houses, factories and farmland. The blame immediately fell on Lapindo Brantas, an oil and gas company drilling just 200 metres away when the volcano started to erupt, and it was ordered to pay nearly $500 million for the damage. Now, 19 months on, the volcano known as LUSI is still erupting, spewing some 70 million litres per day.