Marion Island, Republic of South Africa.
Located in the southern Indian Ocean, 2,300 km SE of Cape
Town,
Marion Island last erupted in 1980 from a fissure extending
from the summit to west coast.
The island is composed of two shield volcanoes and last eruption
was VEI magnitude 1.
The island has an area of 290 km² and is built on a flat-topped
submarine plateau 200m below sea level.
There are 150 scoria cones superimposed on the two shields.
The discovery of the island is accredited to the french explorer
Nicolas Marion-Dufresne in 1772.
Neither he, nor later, Cook in 1776, Ross in 1840, the Gauss
expedition of 1901 were able to land because of adverse weather conditions.
The first attempt to map and describe the geology of the island
was undertaken in 1964-65
Cover below does not show stamp of volcano,
but smaller black cancel has outline map of the island.
The large team cancel to the upper left was designed and paid for
by Edgar K. Haberer who served as Medical Officer and unofficial Postmaster
for the expedition. The 30th Relief Team to Marion left Cape Town on 6.04.1973
on board the Ship MV "RSA" under the command of Captain McNish
and arrived at Marion Island on the 12th of April. The team left Marion
Island on 23rd of May 1974 and arrived at Cape Town on the 29th. Edgar lives
in Germany and is still active in philately, he was Secretary General of
the International Association of Philatelic Journalists (A.I.J.P.) from
2001-2005 and is the Founder and President of the International Study-Group
of the Philately of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta since 1990
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