An “incandescent” show to say the least, between smoke and lava flows. A show offered by Etna, which in the late afternoon of yesterday, Thursday 28 August, was the protagonist of multiple erupting phenomena, with three mouths that erutated at different heights at the top of the volcano between 3,200 and 2,980 meters.
Etna, the spectacular eruption taken from the drone
At sunset, a drone flew over the area, recording the breathtaking images of a unique landscape of its kind, with brilliant orange wash flows that flowed along its slopes and, orange lava spheres raised themselves in the night sky. The authorities have closed some areas of Etna to visitors. As confirmed by Marco Puleo, guide of the southern side of the volcano, the areas above 2,500 meters were banned after an automatic alert system has detected an increase in the activity. In fact, the constant monitoring carried out by the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (Ingv) highlighted the presence of three open altitude fractures, all fueled by lava flows.
Etna’s eruptions attract tourists from different parts of the world, a spectacular phenomenon which, however, must be observed with prudence and at the right distance. Yesterday’s eruption is part of the physiological dynamic of Etna, the largest active volcano in Europe, which in 2024 exceeded the height of 3,400 meters thanks to the continuous paroxysms. “It was a normal eruption – underlined the head of the Department of Civil Protection of the Sicilian Region, Salvo Cocina -, but since it is an unpredictable volcano, everything can happen. It is necessary to adopt the maximum caution, always tending the procedures to be performed in the event of a sudden acceleration of the erupting activity”.