Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Stromboli Erupts: Tourists Advised to Leave

The ANNOTICO Reports

 

This current eruption is No Surprise, since Stromboli is one of three Active Volcanoes in Europe (actually all three are in Italy).   Italy has NINE (9) Dormant Volcanoes Italy.

 

The 1950 movie "Stromboli" starring Ingrid Bergman popularized the island, making it a favourite location for holiday homes for the rich and famous. Designers Dolce & Gabbana, writer Umberto Eco and Italian President Giorgio Napolitano are all reported to have homes on Stromboli.

Volcanoes of Italy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Italy is one of the most volcanically active countries in mainland Europe, possessing the largest volcanoes on the continent, as well as the continent's only active volcanoes.

Three main clusters of volcanism exist: a line of volcanic centres running northwest along the central part of the Italian mainland; a cluster in the northeast of Sicily; and another cluster around the Mediterranean island of Pantelleria.

The country's volcanism is due chiefly to the presence, a short distance to the south, of the boundary between the Eurasian Plate and the African Plate. The magma erupted by Italy's volcanoes is thought to result from the upward forcing of rocks melted by the subduction of one plate below another.

Active volcanoes

Three of Italy's volcanoes have erupted in the last hundred years:

Dormant volcanoes

At least nine other volcanic centres have seen eruptions in historic times, including some submarine volcanoes (seamounts). In order of most recent eruption they are:

  • Pantelleria, off the coast of Tunisia, probably last erupted around 1000 BC. There was a submarine eruption a few kilometres north-east of the island in 1891, which was probably related to the main volcano.
  • Vulcano, another of the Aeolian Islands, last erupted in 1888-1890.
  • The short-lived Isola Ferdinandea erupted a few kilometres north-west of Pantelleria in 1831 and rose to a maximum height of 63 metres, but was eroded back down to sea level by 1835. The summit is now a few metres below the surface. A swarm of small earthquakes centred on the seamount in 2002 was thought to indicate that magma was moving beneath the volcano, but no eruption occurred.
  • Vulcanello is a small volcano connected by an isthmus to the island of Vulcano, which erupted out of the sea in 183 BC and showed occasional activity thereafter until the 16th century.
  • Campi Flegrei, a huge caldera containing the western area of Naples, erupted in 1538, generating the small tuff cone named Monte Nuovo (new mountain).
  • Ischia, an island 20 kilometres west of Naples, last erupted in 1302.
  • Larderello, in southern Tuscany, last erupted in 1282 with a small phreatic eruption
  • Lipari, an island a couple of kilometres from Vulcano, has a volcano which last erupted in 729.
  • Vulsini, at the northern end of the Roman magnetic province, last erupted in 104 BC.
  • Roccamonfina, a volcanic complex 50 km north of Naples, probably erupted around 300 BC wi th a phreatic eruption.

 

 

Italy's Stromboli Erupts, Tourists Told to Quit Coast

 

Reuters

March 1, 2007

Spectacular eruptions from the volcano on the southern Italian island of Stromboli may cause tidal waves, and all locals and tourists should stay away from the coast, emergency services said on Wednesday.

Two big lava flows burst out of Stromboli's side on Tuesday, sending up vast plumes of steam as they plunged into the Mediterranean waters below. Authorities said there was no immediate risk to people living on the island, off the coast of Sicily.

"The eruption (lava flows) are very well fed," said Enzo Boschi, head of Italy's National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology.

"But there's no reason to think that anything extraordinary will happen in the short term. The population is not at risk."

Locals fear a repeat of the events of December 2002 when a similar upsurge in volcanic activity caused a massive chunk of rock to drop into the sea, causing a 10-metre (33 foot) tidal wave that ruined houses close to the shore.

Emergency sirens sounded on the island when the new eruption began and local authorities ordered all residents to move to at least 10 metres above the water line.

The lava is flowing down an uninhabited part of the island and the risk, either of a greater eruption or of a tsunami, have not been deemed great enough to prompt a full-scale evacuation.

In winter only a few hundred people live on Stromboli, but the population swells to several thousand in the summer.

Tourists are drawn to climb to the 924 metre (3,000 ft) summit of the live volcano and peer down into its crater as the volcano blasts molten rock high into the sky.

The island was the setting for a 1950 movie starring Ingrid Bergman and in recent decades has, along with other islands in the Aeolian archipelago, become a favourite location for holiday homes for the rich and famous.

Designers Dolce & Gabbana, writer Umberto Eco and Italian President Giorgio Napolitano are all reported to have homes on Stromboli.

http://www.theage.com.au/news/travel/

volcano-erupts-tourists-told-to-quit-coast/

2007/03/01/1172338752572.html

 

The ANNOTICO Reports

Can be Viewed, and are Archived at:

Italia USA: http://www.ItaliaUSA.com (Formerly Italy at St Louis)

Annotico Email: annotico@earthlink.net