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Explanation: Yes, but can your volcano do this? To the surprise of some, Mt. Etna emits, on occasion, smoke rings. Technically known as vortex rings, the walls of the volcano slightly slow the outside of emitted smoke puffs, causing the inside gas to move faster. A circle of low pressure develops so that the emitted puff of volcanic gas and ash loops around in a ring, a familiar geometric structure that can be surprisingly stable as it rises. Smoke rings are quite rare and need a coincidence of the right geometry of the vent, the right speed of ejected smoke,...

A rare spectacle appeared in the sky over Sicily’s Mount Etna recently, as huge smoky vortex rings were spotted rising above the massive volcano. The largest volcano currently active in Europe, Mount Etna rises to a height of 10,902 feet (3,323 meters), making it both the tallest volcano on the continent, in addition to being the most active. Visitors to the area recently spotted the volcano producing unusual circles of what appeared to be smoke, known as vortex rings, which are actually the result of condensed gases from deep underground that make their way to the surface. Once they manifest...

STORY: Volcanic vortex rings are natural, near-perfect circles of gas emitted from a volcano under specific conditions and scientists say Mount Etna emits more than any other volcano on earth. It is a relatively rare phenomenon caused by a constant release of vapours and gases. The gaseous mass ascends rapidly through the central part of the conduit, promoting the formation of rings by wrapping the gas upon itself in a vortex motion. Giuseppe Barbagallo, of the South Etna Alpine Guides Group, said the last time this happened at the Etna volcano was last December. The rings have led locals to...

Here’s everything you need to know about how often Mount Etna erupts and how it affects travel and tourism. Mount Etna, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, has been making headlines in the last few years thanks to dramatic eruptions. It lies on the Italian island of Sicily and looms over the city of Catania. This week, Catania airport was forced to close temporarily and driving restrictions were put in place following an eruption that spewed ash over the surrounding area. If you’re thinking of booking a holiday to Catania and eastern Sicily, you may be concerned that volcanic...

Flights serving the eastern Sicilian city of Catania were halted on Monday after an eruption from nearby Mount Etna, local authorities said, bringing fresh travel woe to the crisis-plagued Italian airport. The 3,330 metre (10,925 ft) high volcano burst into action overnight, firing lava and ash high over the Mediterranean island. The lava flow subsided before dawn, but ash was still coming from one of the craters. Flights to and from Catania, a popular tourist destination, would be suspended until 8:00 p.m. (1800 GMT), the airport said on Twitter. Catania Mayor Enrico Trantino banned the use of motorcycles and bicycles...

Flights from Catania airport in Sicily were grounded on Sunday after volcanic ash from an eruption of Mount Etna covered the runways. Airport authorities announced that flights would be suspended until Monday 9 a.m. local time (3 a.m. ET) due to the fallout from the eruption on Twitter. They later told CNN that flights are expected to resume at midday Monday (6 a.m. ET).

Scientists studying ice cores packing in some 60,000 years of history have found signs of thousands of volcanic eruptions across that time, stretching back to the last Ice Age – with 25 of the eruptions larger than anything Earth has seen in the last 2,500 years. Researchers excavated the cores near both poles: in Antarctica (where 737 eruptions were logged) and Greenland (where 1,113 eruptions were found). A total of 85 eruptions were large enough to leave evidence behind at both poles. That evidence takes the form of sulfuric acid deposits left behind by the eruptions. It gives researchers clues...

Mount Etna has roared back to spectacular action after a few months of relative quiet, sending up a 12-kilometer (7.5-mile) high volcanic ash cloud over eastern Sicily. The lava flow from Etna, one of Europe’s most active volcanoes, was centered around the crater on the mountain’s southeast slope, Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology said Monday. There were no immediate reports of injuries or property damage on the inhabited towns ringing the slopes of the volcano, which is popular with hikers, skiers and other tourists.

The Mount Etna volcano started a new eruption on February 10th, 2022. Over the span of several minutes, a large explosive eruption at the southeast crater occurred, creating pyroclastic flows which traveled several kilometers alongside producing several thousand foot tall fountains of lava. However, the eruption is not over, and larger explosions could occur in the next several days to weeks. This video will cover what might happen next and state the series of events which led to this explosive eruption.0:00 Mount Etna Erupts0:53 Geologic Context1:04 Where the Eruption Occurred1:20 A Paroxysm2:16 Relation to "Star Wars"3:24 What will happen nextMount...

Explanation: What happening above that volcano? Something very unusual -- a volcanic light pillar. More typically, light pillars are caused by sunlight and so appear as a bright column that extends upward above a rising or setting Sun. Alternatively, other light pillars -- some quite colorful -- have been recorded above street and house lights. This light pillar, though, was illuminated by the red light emitted by the glowing magma of an erupting volcano. The volcano is Italy's Mount Etna, and the featured image was captured with a single shot a few hours after sunset in mid-June. Freezing temperatures above...

As suspected already last night by the presence of intermittent strombolian activity and the slowly rising tremor, this activity continued to evolve gradually throughout the night and early this morning. Tremor reached high levels at 7.40 a.m., followed by a strong increase of explosive activity at the SE crater from 10.15 a.m. Lava fountaining was observed to have started at around that time, and lasted until 12.20 p.m. It generated a dense ash plume that rose several kilometers and drifted east, producing ash falls in the area of Piedimonte and Linguaglossa.

New video shows the moment when Mount Etna, Europe's largest active volcano, spewed bubbling lava and hot ash into the Sicilian sky earlier this week.On Sunday (Jan. 17), lava began "oozing" from the Etna's southeast crater and toward the east, according to Boris Behncke, a volcanologist at the INGV-Osservatorio Etneo in Catania, Sicily, Express reported. By Monday evening, the crater exploded in a "new paroxysmal eruptive episode," releasing bursts of lava, hot ash and gas, Behncke tweeted. One lava flow spilled over the east side of the crater, snaking toward the uninhabited Valle del Bove, a horseshoe-shape depression in the...

Scientists aren't particularly surprised to find volcanism in the region, which is home to active volcanoes like Mount Vesuvius and Mount Etna. But the new complex is unusual because it was created by a rare kind of fault... The western Mediterranean is seismically restless because of the collision of three tectonic plates: the African, the Eurasian and the Anatolian. Making matters more complex is a small chunk of crust called the Adriatic-Ionian microplate, which broke off of the African Plate more than 65 million years ago and is now being pushed under the larger Eurasian Plate in a process called...

A 12-METRE monolith, hacked out of limestone by stone-age humans some nine thousand years ago, has been found at the bottom of the Mediterranean. The enormous stone totem, now split in two and sitting in the Sicilian Channel between Tunisia and Sicily, was hewed from a rocky outcrop some 300m away when the Mediterranean Sea was still a dry basin. It’s now under 40m of water. The new study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, says the area was submerged about 9350 years ago (give or take 200 years) when the last Ice Age retreated. Before that time the...

ROME (Reuters) - An underwater volcano with a base larger than Washington D.C. has been discovered just off the shores of Sicily, a scientist with Italy's National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology said on Thursday. The volcanic structure, which incorporates peaks previously thought to be separate volcanoes, was named Empedocles after the Greek philosopher who named the four classic elements of earth, air, fire and water. Legend has it that the philosopher died by throwing himself into Mount Etna, the nearby Sicilian volcano. Giovanni Lanzafame, who works at the institute and led the research, said Empedocles was at least 400...

The Mount Etna volcano erupted on Monday, spewing ash as several minor earthquakes hit the region, and prompting a partial closure of the Sicilian airspace around the mountain. Italy's national institute for geophysics and vulcanology (INGV) counted more than 130 seismic shocks in the zone, with the strongest reaching a magnitude of 4.0."The eruption occurred on the side of Etna," Boris Behncke, a vulcanologist at INGV, told AFP. "It's the first lateral eruption in more than 10 years, but it doesn't seem to be dangerous."Due to bad visibility because of the ash authorities restricted local airspace, allowing only four landings...

MOUNT Etna has erupted sparking fear across Sicily as Europe's biggest and most powerful volcano sends an ash cloud across the holiday isle in Italy. Italy’s Mount Etna has started spewing lava in what is its second eruption of the year. Giant fountains of lava could be seen sprouting from the volcano, located on the isle of Sicily, as far away as Catania, around 30 kilometres away, and the resort town of Taormina.

“There is a likely chance of tsunami waves reaching the shores of Israel,” says Dr. Beverly Goodman of the Leon H. Charney School of Marine Sciences at the University of Haifa following an encompassing geo-archaeological study at the port of Caesarea. “Tsunami events in the Mediterranean do occur less frequently than in the Pacific Ocean, but our findings reveal a moderate rate of recurrence,” she says. Dr. Goodman, an expert geo-archaeologist, exposed geological evidence of this by chance. Her original intentions in Caesarea were to assist in research at the ancient port and at offshore shipwrecks. “We expected to find...

Europe's most active volcano, Mount Etna, erupts sending columns of lava and ash high into the air. The spectacular visual display was accompanied by loud explosions. Airport authorities at Catania in Sicily closed the airport to avoid the hazardous ash clouds caused by the eruption

A deluge that swept the Land of Israel more than 7,000 years ago, submerging six Neolithic villages opposite the Carmel Mountains, is the origin of the biblical flood of Noah, a British marine archeologist said Tuesday. The new theory about the source of the great flood detailed in the Book of Genesis comes amid continuing controversy among scholars over whether the inundation of the Black Sea more than seven millennia ago was the biblical flood. In the theory posited by British marine archeologist Dr. Sean Kingsley and published in the Bulletin of the Anglo-Israeli Archaeological Society, the drowning of the...