page_title: Huaynaputina
section_title: North America
hierarchical_section_title: Huaynaputina / Global atmospheric impacts of the 1600 eruption / Far field consequences / North America
caption_attribution_description: Remains of the 1639 Jamestown Church tower (with 20th century reconstruction on the original foundations)
context_page_description: Huaynaputina is a stratovolcano in a volcanic upland in southern Peru. Part of the Central Volcanic Zone of the Andean Volcanic Belt, it is the product of the subduction of the oceanic Nazca tectonic plate beneath the continental part of the South American tectonic plate at a rate of 10.3 centimetres per year. Huaynaputina is a large volcanic crater, lacking an identifiable mountain profile, with an outer stratovolcano and three younger volcanic vents. The vents of Huaynaputina form a north-northwest–south-southeast trend.
  The volcano erupted several times during the Holocene, the largest eruption took place in the year 1600. The 1600 eruption was the largest historical eruption in South America, measuring 6 on the Volcanic Explosivity Index. It occurred on 19 February and continued with a series of events into March. Witnessed by the people of the city of Arequipa, its impact in the region was severe, wiping out vegetation and burying the surroundings with 2 metres of volcanic rock; it also damaged infrastructure and economic resources.
context_section_description: Thin tree rings and frost rings have been found in trees of the Western USA such as in Montana and correlate to the Huaynaputina eruption. 1601 and 1603 tree rings close to the tree line in Quebec indicate cold temperatures, and anomalous tree rings and cooling in Idaho have been linked to the eruption as well. 1601 saw the coldest temperature in a Seward Peninsula, Alaska record of the last 600 years, as well as in other places of northwestern and southeastern Alaska. Noticeable cooling has been inferred for the Western US from tree ring data. In addition, weather in the Arctic Archipelago of Canada was unusually wet.
  The Huaynaputina eruption was followed by a drought in the Eastern US and may have hindered the establishment of the colony in Jamestown, Virginia, where mortality from malnutrition was high. In addition, the eruption may have contributed to the disappearance of the Monongahela culture from North America, along with other climate phenomena linked to the El Niño-Southern Oscillation.
caption: The church of the Jamestown colony, where the eruption appears to have caused a drought and high mortality
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