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Île de la Réunion

  
Introduction

Reunion is a French island in the Western Indian Ocean, about 700 km east of Madagascar and 200 km west of Mauritius. With Mauritius and Rodrigues Islands, they form the Mascarene Archipelago. The island is entirely volcanic and originates on the ocean floor at a depth of 4,000 meters.

Origin

The origin of the island is commonly attributed to a hot spot. According to certain scientists, this hot spot first created the Deccan Traps, a large basalt province in India, about 65 million years ago and may have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. Its trace corresponds to Chagos-Lacadive Ridge, Mascarene Plateau, and Mauritius Island (created between 18 and 28 million years ago). Reunion became active about 5 million years ago, reaching the surface about 2 million years ago, and is the youngest island originating from this hot spot.

The island is elliptical (50 x 70 km), with a northwest-southeast elongation. It is composed of two Hawaiian-type shield volcanoes: Piton des Neiges (3,069 m) and Piton de la Fournaise (2,631 m). Piton des Neiges emerged from the sea about 2 million years ago and has been inactive for 20,000 years. Deeply eroded, it occupies the north-western two thirds of the island. Piton de la Fournaise, on the south-eastern part of the island, became active more than 500,000 years ago on the flanks of Piton des Neiges.

Piton de la Fournaise, one of the most active volcanoes in the world, has a mean time between eruptions of 10 months for the last two centuries and at least 125 recorded eruptions during the last century.

The fragile nature of the land, combined with mountainous terrain and high rainfall, often produces landslides and catastrophic rock falls.

Related issues

The Mascarene plateau
Species dispersal

Phelsuma species

P. borbonica borbonica
P. borbonica mater
P. inexpectata

 

  

© Copyright 1991-2004 Phelsumania - Emmanuel Van Heygen