Were Famed Pink And White Terraces Destroyed Or Buried?

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 91, 6 September 1948, Page 4

Were Famed Pink And White Terraces Destroyed Or Buried?

When the top blew off Tarawera Mountain on June 10, 1886, in New Zealand’s most devastating eruption, were the Pink and White Terraces destroyed completely, or merely buried under the debris? And if they were buried, exactly where under the surface of Lake Rotomahana are they resting now? After eight years of research, Mr J. Healy, the Government vulcanologist -in ‘Rotorua, may have the answers. j. Mr Healy has collected hundreds of photographs of tne area, covering periods before the eruption, a' few days after, and up to 1904, v(hen reafforestation had taken place on the scarred slopes. > The Pink and White Terraces, which were as unique as Niagara Falls, - were not marked accurately on any maps of those days. The thousands of tons of rock and ash which poured from the volcano completely changed the layout ,of th‘e valley, burying many fafniliar land-.

marks, so that it was impossible to point even approximately to the point where the terraces had stood. The eruptionValso blocked up the outlet of the small lake which existed then and gradually the water level in the basin started to rise, until the whole valley floor was covered under what is now Lake Rotomahana. Mr Healy picks up a photo taken from, say, Black Peak, in 1885. Soon, he hopes to go out to Black Peak, photo in hand, and take a bearing along the photo over the waters of the lake. Then to repeat the'process with a dozen or a hundred different photographs, taken from other points around the valley. The' bearing lines, drawn on a map, must cross at some point. Under that point rests what is left of the terraces. Now, having located the position of the terraces, it should be possible to establish their fate. An extensive series of “snaps” taken four days after the eruption by a party of surveyors, and over a period of many months afterwards by the curious-minded, show the places in the valley where the explosions occurred. If craters did not appear around the site of the terraces, then they must have been merely buried. Or if big, round chasms did spring up, the terraces were blown sky-high.