On February 8, 2025, Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) reported that Mount Etna had begun exhibiting “signs of unrest above its background level.”
On February 8, 2025, Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) reported that Mount Etna had begun exhibiting “signs of unrest above its background level.” That’s unsurprising for the frequently unruly Sicilian peak, one of the most active stratovolcanoes in the world. But the fiery explosions, disruptive ash clouds, and long lava flows that ensued stood out as being unusually spectacular to many Etna watchers.
The OLI (Operational Land Imager) on the Landsat 8 satellite acquired this image of an ongoing eruption on February 13. The natural-color scene is overlaid with an infrared signal to distinguish the lava’s heat signature on Etna’s snowy slopes.
On the day the image was acquired, INGV reported that Etna’s explosive activity was decreasing but that weak ash emissions were ongoing. A lava flow extended approximately 3 kilometers (2 miles) from the Bocca Nuova crater down the mountain’s southwestern flank. A volcanic plume was also visible drifting to the northeast, away from the 3,357-meter (11,014-foot) peak.
Read more at NASA Earth Observatory
Image: NASA Earth Observatory image by Wanmei Liang, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey.
