Bougainville is an island northwest of the Solomon Islands and east of New Britain and Papua New Guinea. Bagana is one of seven volcanoes on Bougainville that have been active in the last 10,000 years. Bagana, classified as a lava cone, is made of thick steep-sided blocky lava flows.
Pyroclastic deposits are a minor volume of the volcano.
This photo of Bagana shows the southwest slopes of the volcano and was taken in October, 1964. Photo courtesy of Jack Lockwood, U.S. Geological Survey. The first known eruption of Bagana was in 1842. Since then there have been at least 22 eruptions. Bagana has been erupting since 1972, creating slow-moving lava flows.