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- On 10 September, a rockfall from a wall that divided the SE Crater and the depression on the middle part of the E flank produced an ash plume that drifted W. Lava flows and strombolian activity from the summit of the SE Crater continued on 11 September.- Source: Volcano World
Originally posted by worldwatcher
have there been any swarms of smaller scale quakes in the area??? namely in between the sicily quake and Etna
that would suggest that magma or lava is moving under the volcanos.
ROME, Italy (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 Volcanology 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 meters (1,300 feet) high -- taller than the Eiffel Tower.
He said the base of the structure was 30 km (18.6 miles) long and 25 km wide, spanning an area larger than the U.S. capital and making it Italy's largest underwater volcano.
But Lanzafame said Sicilians did not need to worry about the sleeping Empedocles. "At this point, there's no imminent danger of an eruption," he told Reuters.
Lanzafame and another official said the volcano had numerous fumaroles, openings in the Earth's crust that emit steam and gases, like the ones at Yellowstone National Park in the United States. But they described it as largely inactive.
The identification of Empedocles came during research into the submerged volcanic island of Ferdinandea just off Sicily's southern coast. Often held to be the tip of a small volcano, Lanzafame said it was just a part of Empedocles.
Volcanic activity has raised the island out of the sea several times in recorded history, with underwater eruptions first described during the first Punic War of 264-241 B.C.
Its emergence in 1831 caused months of international wrangling, with several nations making territorial claims before it submerged again. It is now about 7 meters below the surface of the water.
Cesare Corselli, president of the National Inter-University Consortium for Marine Science, which helped with the research, said previously the volcanic centers had been seen as separate. (..)
June 2006.