Back in 2011, we posted a short quiz: Is Kick’em Jenny a Dutch rockabilly singer, a Dutch Celtic Symfo-Folk band or an active submarine volcano on the floor of the Caribbean Sea? The answer is yes to all three. I am not sure what the first two are up to these days, but the underwater volcano is acting up.

Kick’em Jenny, is located off the northern coast of Grenada, in the Lesser Antilles, and is roughly 600 feet underwater. As reported by CNN, officials raised its threat level Thursday to orange, which means it could erupt with less than 24-hour notice. An eruption could sink ships and hurl hot rock and ash into the air. Kick’em Jenny started rumbling on July 11, and has produced more than 200 small earthquakes since then, according to the Seismic Research Centre at the University of the West Indies.

Kick’em Jenny may have caused one of Grenada’s worst maritime tragedies. From the Seismic Research Centre website:  Submarine volcanoes release large quantities of gas bubbles into the water, even in quiet times between eruptions. This can lower the density of the seawater above the vent. This is very dangerous to shipping, because boats entering a zone of lowered water density will lose buoyancy and may sink.

On the 5th August 1944, the wooden schooner Island Queen, with over 60 people on board, disappeared between Grenada and St. Vincent. At the time it was thought that a German or allied submarine had torpedoed the boat. These theories, however, cannot easily explain the total lack of debris after the boat’s disappearance. However, if a boat sinks because of lowered water density everything would sink.

Kick ’em Jenny had, in fact erupted the year before (1943) and it is highly likely that it was still actively degassing in 1944, without any signs at the sea surface of such activity.