[Red Badger]

Redneck Neanderthals?........................

[Red Badger]

PinGGG!....................

[AppyPappy]

But did not climb down

[C210N]

Poor fellow... was smart and brave. Thought he/she would try and stomp it out.

[ClearCase_guy]

Assuming they truly are Neanderthals, it's a reasonable – even if not solid – bet that the footprints were left by a gang of young Neanderthal adults.

Yutes.

[GingisK]

Perhaps this is also a means of dating the use of beer.

[Justa]

Woke Neanderthals ....delivering their grievances to The Man

[Gen.Blather]

Yep, they had to climb up there to throw the virgin in. Probably it was some poor girl who was “deemed” a virgin as volcanoes are pretty stupid. Bet she was beauty challenged as well. No sense in wasting a perfectly good sacrifice if you can just find one who will serve.

(In burials of the nomadic peoples in the Russian step, it was found that they sacrificed some very old horses and some slaves who were obviously past their best by.)

[dfwgator]

“You better start doing it right!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjRQgTbbfwA

[Yo-Yo]

Perhaps disaster tourism isn't a recent thing, after all.

"My parents visited Roccamonfina volcano, but all I got was this lousy animal skin..."

[moovova]

You'd think, with the passing of time, people would've grown smarter...but no...

[DannyTN]

Possibilities:

• They were trying to rescue Ugg who had made some really bad choices in life.
• They were temporarily headed up to reach a safer trail down.
• There was a nagging woman at home, and this seemed like a reasonable get away.
• Hold our beers and watch this.
• There was free barbecued mountain goat for the taking.
• They were heading up to offer sacrifices to appease the Volcano God.
• Prehistoric Hillary was getting rid of her slate mail.
• Prehistoric Biden had wondered off.
• Lava sledding.

[Vaduz]

The first of the Biden blood line and it never got any better.

[Carpe Cerevisi]

“Hold muh mead!”

[Bonemaker]

Cave democrats.

[bobbo666]

Perhaps. Walking back out after having tossed in the sacrifice — that obviously stopped the eruption.

[Doctor Congo]

This article got me to thinking. If you were a caveman living near that volcano you probably would have noticed that people getting too near it suddenly died from the poisonous gasses and associating that with an angry volcano god. There is nothing more awe inspiring to cavemen than a volcano. Volcano god is killing people one or a few at a time (poisonous gases) and sometimes huge groups (pyrocastic flows).

I would guess that some ritual forced them to climb to the top as soon as possible after an eruption. If they had shamans then he would have done the climbing in the hot ash, after some peyote or other plant drug.

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

By the time he got to the top, the footprints were probably wider (not reported) indicating he was on his above-the-knee nubs when he got there.

[JimRed]

Just what inspired an ancient group of hominids to go trouncing through the cooling soot and debris after the mountain violently blew its lid is anybody's guess, though it's clear from the impressions that nobody was in a hurry.

Looking for food, animals that were caught in the eruption, pre-cooked and ready to eat.

[bunkerhill7]

Spock`s parents landed on the volcano to refuel, went down the side of volcano to take some Neanderthal virgins back with them. That why Spock is half Vulcan and half human. Vulcans can live a long long time.

[DeplorablePaul]

Joe Versus The Volcano (1990) Official Trailer - Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan Comedy HD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmQDIne3CLo

Tom Hanks comedy. Fairly funny.