Krakatoa: The Last Days is a BBC Television docudrama based upon a selection of four eyewitness accounts of the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, an active stratovolcano between the islands of Sumatra and Java, present day Indonesia.
It is the second greatest volcanic eruption in recorded history (after Mount Tambora, only 68 years earlier), erupting more than 18 cubic kilometers of tephra in less than 48 hours, and killing about 36,500 people.
The film also has a subplot concerning Rogier Verbeek (played by Kevin McMonagle), a Dutch geologist who had surveyed the area two years earlier and laid the basis for modern vulcanology with his research after the eruption. He adds a scientific touch and a helpful map to the computer-generated imagery that convincingly portrays the ash cloud, collapse of the mountain, pyroclastic flows, and tsunamis.
The film also features a distressing portrayal of a family trying to escape the devastating volcano, and a horrifying video of the eruption reaching its height engulfing a ship with more than 100 passengers.
