A Bird’s Eye View of Earth’s Newest Island

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DigitalGlobe / Getty Images

This island was created off the coast of Gwadar when Pakistan was hit by a 7.8-magnitude earthquake on Sept. 24, 2013. Imagery collected on Sept. 26, 2013.

A massive earthquake that tragically killed more than 300 people and destroyed scores of mud huts in southwestern Pakistan on Tuesday also offered a surreal moment of creation. The tremor unleashed an underwater “mud volcano”  that spewed mud and earth to create a new island, half a mile off the coast of the Pakistani port city of Gwadar. This satellite image, published for the first time here, depicts the 200-foot-wide island (and 100 feet high) in the middle of the Arabian Sea.