Etna erupts: the spectacular images

When nature awakens and decides to show itself in all its majesty, it does it great. As is often the case with the eruptions of Etna in Sicily, the highest active volcano in Europe. Last night the volcano was the protagonist of a spectacular eruption and this morning Catania and some of the surrounding areas woke up covered by a thick blanket of lava ash.

«The most evident effect also from Taormina, Catania and the Syracusan coast was the eruptive columnAs he explained all’Ansa the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology of Catania.

“Determined by the paroxysm and loaded with ash and lapilli that rose a few kilometers above the top of the volcano and, pushed by the wind towards the south, caused the pyroclastic material to fall back on the inhabited centers up to Catania and Syracuse, tens of kilometers away away from Etna “.

After a few hours of closure, which began yesterday afternoon with the first ashes carried in the air by the eruption, the international airport of Catania is back operational. All night the staff worked on the slopes to clean them of ash.

The inhabitants told of the loud roar that accompanied the eruption of the volcano, which saw as the protagonist the south-east crater, already in motion for some weeks. “The source of the tremor remains confined below the Southeast crater, in the depth range between 2900 and 3000 meters above sea level. The increase in tremor is accompanied by violent infrasonic activity with high amplitude signals ». But the Ingv volcanologists reassure the extent of the eruption and the clearly visible lava flows that “remain within the Bove valley”.

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