Mount Etna erupting causing airports to cancel flights

Mt Etna Smoke Rings

Important Takeaways:

  • Italy’s Mount Etna spews out lava and blows out smoke rings in first eruption since 1992 – bringing Sicily’s Catania airport to a close and suspending flights
  • Italy’s Mount Etna has brought planes leaving the Sicilian city of Catania to a standstill after it was captured spewing hot lava and ash overnight.
  • The airport, which sits on the east of the Mediterranean island just 30 miles south of the volcano, said that flights to and from the hub would be suspended until at least 8 pm local time tonight.
  • The volcano was seen blowing smoke rings out of its crater as early as last Thursday.
  • The eruption, which is the first seen from Mount Etna since 1992, saw lava flow until just before dawn, though ash is still coming out of one of its craters.

Read the original article by clicking here.

Eruption at Mount Etna brings airlines to a standstill

Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.

Important Takeaways:

  • Mount Etna eruption grounds flights in Sicily with clouds of ash
  • 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
  • Pictures and video footage show black volcanic ash covering planes at the airport, and blanketing roads in the area.
  • The ash was produced by a paroxysmal eruption that sent lava fountains more than 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) into the air, Boris Behncke, a vulcanologist at the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology’s Etna observatory, told CNN.
  • The observatory said in a statement that the eruptive phase ended around 9 p.m. Sunday, but it couldn’t predict when a new phase might begin.

Read the original article by clicking here.

Volcanic explosion on Mount Etna injures 10 people

FILE PHOTO A tourist stands in front of Italy's Mount Etna, Europe's tallest and most active volcano, as it spews lava during an eruption on the southern island of Sicily, Italy February 28, 2017. REUTERS/Antonio Parrinello/File photo

ROME (Reuters) – Ten people were injured in an eruption on Mount Etna on Thursday when magma flowing into snow caused a violent explosion that sent stones and rocks flying into the air, emergency services said.

Amongst those hurt near the summit of Etna on the island of Sicily were members of a television crew filming for the BBC.

“Running down a mountain pelted by rocks, dodging burning boulders and boiling steam – not an experience I ever ever want to repeat,” the BBC’s science correspondent Rebecca Morelle wrote on Twitter.

“BBC team all ok – some cuts/ bruises and burns. Very shaken though – it was extremely scary,” she said.

Italian officials said six people had to be taken to hospital, but none were in a serious condition.

Etna is Europe’s most active volcano. After a quiet couple of years it burst into action in February with repeated explosive eruptions that sent orange plumes of lava into the air.

Thursday’s explosion was the result of a so-called phreatomagmatic eruption, caused by magma hitting water — in this case snow.

(Reporting by Crispian Balmer; editing by Richard Lough)