Die Sulfur mine of Kawah Ijen
Rice fields and the landscape of Kawah
Day and night images of the crater and its acid sea, left
down you can discover the sulfur flames in the mine area.
Already of the previous visits of
Martin ' Blue Flames' photographically we arrived at
darkness at the edge of crater of the volcano Ijen.
Impressively the crater lake showed us in the full moon
light its milky blue colouring. At the edge of the crater
lake intensively blue sulfur flames which could showed up
the natural condition are enclose by water vapour sulfur
clouds. Because of the forward expanding industrial
dismantling progress the naturally burning sulfur rivers are
currently destroyed. These were not no more observed by us.
The reason is that this „natural occurence“ gets
extincted by water
around the clock. A sulfur burn-up
would hinder the dismantling by the enormous heat and the
burning sulfur would decrease the purity for cosmetic
Sulfur catchment and down ward inclined pipes. At the end
opened barrels for the condensing process.
Collected and condensing liquid sulfur is pouring out of
apprx. 50 pipes and get cooled down in small basins.
The water cooling on the pipes is accelerating the
On stalaktites downdropping sulfur in its delightful color
is a real eye candy.
Liquid sulfur impressions
The complete impassable area is also the reason that
under these hell conditions the sulfur get mined out by
hand. The breathing near the sulfur discharges is nearly
impossible and if you catch a breeze of this biting
aerosol you have really problems for the next few hours
with your respiration.
Gas masks and appropriate carrier equipment are rare.
For a cartload of 70 kilograms sulfur carried by baskets
fixed with flat bamboo slats over a 200m elevation to
the crater rim, and in addition 4 km down the valley
they earn for one job 60000 Rupiah. Something about 7 $.