Busuanga, is the largest island in the

Calamian Group of islands The Calamian Islands or the Calamianes is a group of islands in the province of Palawan, Philippines. It includes: * Busuanga Island * Coron Island * Culion, Culion Island * Calauit Island * Malcapuya Island * Banana Island * Pass Island * Calumb ...

in the province of

Palawan Palawan (), officially the Province of Palawan ( cyo, Probinsya i'ang Palawan; tl, Lalawigan ng Palawan), is an archipelagic province of the Philippines that is located in the region of Mimaropa. It is the largest province in the country in t ...

in the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

. Busuanga Island is the second largest island in the province after

Palawan island Palawan is the largest island of the province of Palawan in the Philippines and fifth-largest by area and tenth-most populous island of the country, with a total population of 994,101 as of 2020 census. The north west coast of the island is alon ...

itself. The island is located halfway between the islands of Mindoro and Palawan with the

South China Sea The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phi ...

located to the west and the Sulu Sea to the southeast. South of the island are the two other major islands of the Calamian Group: Culion Island and

Coron Island Coron is the third-largest island in the Calamian Islands in northern Palawan in the Philippines. The island is part of the larger municipality of the same name. It is about southwest of Manila and is known for several Japanese shipwrecks of W ...

. The western third of the island is under the municipality of Busuanga and the eastern two-thirds belong to the municipality of Coron. Busuanga Island is known as a

recreational diving Recreational diving or sport diving is diving for the purpose of leisure and enjoyment, usually when using scuba equipment. The term "recreational diving" may also be used in contradistinction to "technical diving", a more demanding aspect of ...

location due to

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Japanese wrecks that were sunk by American navy bombings in Coron Bay, a natural anchorage near the town center of Coron, on September 24, 1944.

Geology

Part of the North Palawan Block, Busuanga Island consists mainly of the Liminangcong Formation, a

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last ...

Late Jurassic The Late Jurassic is the third epoch of the Jurassic Period, and it spans the geologic time from 163.5 ± 1.0 to 145.0 ± 0.8 million years ago (Ma), which is preserved in Upper Jurassic strata.Owen 1987. In European lithostratigraphy, the name ...

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a ...

. This chert forms the distinguishing mountain ranges, with the Middle-Late Jurassic Guinlo Formation clastics forming the valleys on Busuanga. Busuanga was known for its tabular

manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...

deposits found within the chert sequence, thick and extending laterally up to .

Braunite Braunite is a silicate mineral containing both di- and tri-Valence (chemistry), valent manganese with the chemical formula: Mn2+Mn3+6 8, SiO4 Common impurities include iron, calcium, boron, barium, titanium, aluminium, and magnesium. Braunite ...

is the common manganese mineral type found in the

ore Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically containing metals, that can be mined, treated and sold at a profit.Encyclopædia Britannica. "Ore". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 7 Apr ...

Reference

External links

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Images from a dive trip to Coron, Busuanga in April 2006

Landscapes of Busuanga 2012
{{Authority control Calamian Islands Underwater diving sites in the Philippines