The glowing fragments of lava leaping into the Sicilian sky on Sunday evening were the culmination of a day of escalating drama at Europe’s most active volcano. Mount Etna had erupted violently earlier that morning, sending plumes of volcanic ash about a mile into the air and forcing Catania Airport to suspend all incoming flights – a decision that stranded hundreds of thousands of British holidaymakers who rely on the airport each year.
Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) raised the aviation alert to red after detecting intense Strombolian activity – short, rhythmic bursts of gas that blast glowing pieces of magma from a vent on the upper eastern flank of the Voragine summit crater. The effusive lava flow that had been active since June 26 stopped on July 4, but the Strombolian eruptions continued, and by Sunday evening a livestream on afarTV captured the volcano putting on a “fiery show”, hurling volcanic bombs and lava clots tens to hundreds of metres into the air.
“Mount Etna erupts, sending ash a mile high, forcing Catania Airport to cancel all flights and triggering a red aviation alert.”
The ash began rising from the volcano at around 7.45am local time, intensifying shortly before 9am, according to local reports. Italy’s national airline, ITA Airways, confirmed that all departing and arriving flights at Catania Airport would be cancelled or rescheduled. Flight monitoring service Flight Radar 24 displayed all arriving flights as cancelled. Sicilian broadcaster Radio Una Voce Vicina reported that flight restrictions remained in place due to the ongoing presence of volcanic ash in the atmosphere, with sector B2 of the airspace – the area affected by the volcanic cloud on the southern side of Mount Etna – closed until at least 7pm local time (6pm BST).
The INGV, through the Etna Observatory, elevated the aviation alert from orange to red following the summit activity. Local news outlet La Sicilia described the ash emissions as “in full swing”, noting that a red alert is issued when an ash cloud presents a potential hazard to aircraft. Experts continued to monitor developments through visual and thermal cameras positioned on the volcano.
Mount Etna, on Sicily’s eastern coastline between Messina and Catania, is one of Europe’s highest and most active stratovolcanoes, existing in an almost perpetual state of activity. Its most recent eruption before Sunday had been documented on January 1 this year. During recent weeks, local reports observed a gradual lava flow from a fissure that formed around 3,000 metres at the base of the Northeast Crater, and the INGV confirmed it detected activity in the upper Valle del Leone on June 26. For the thousands of travellers whose flights were grounded, the question remained: when would the skies clear?