5 of the Most Explosive Volcanic Eruptions

In the shadow of the world's most infamous volcanoes, history has been shaped by fire and ash. From the catastrophic eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815, which forged a nearly four-mile caldera and altered global temperatures, to the thunderous explosion of Krakatoa in 1883, these titanic forces of nature have left indelible marks on both the Earth's surface and humanity's memory.

Here are five of the most explosive volcanic disasters throughout history and where they rank on the volcanic explosivity index (VEI) — a scale used to measure how much volcanic material erupts from the volcano, how high the volcanic matter extends into the atmosphere and how long the eruption lasts.