La Palma Erupts: A Video Chronology
One thing is true about living on an active volcanic island: your gamble with lava is probably a losing bet. The people of La Palma just got a rather spectacular reminder on Sunday that the volcano always wins.
That’s the bad news. The good news: volcanoes, unlike earthquakes, usually give us adequate notice as to what’s coming.
La Palma got just over a week’s notice that something was up, and increasing seismicity warned authorities to begin evacuations before the eruption began. Livestock and people with disabilities were removed from the danger zone early; thousands of other residents were hurried to safety after the fissure first opened and the eruption began.
I’d been planning to resume our Mediterranean Geology series at the end of this month, but we’re going to talk about La Palma for a bit instead. For one thing, it’s a pretty terrifying volcano, considering the speculation that a sector collapse of its flank could wipe out the east coast of North America with a megatsunami. The idea brought up in the above video – spraying water on the flows – ties neatly into a topic I wanted to address soon: human efforts to persuade lava to stop or change course. The seismic lead-up was fascinating. And this eruption is somewhat similar to what happened to Tripergoli, so it’s a nice modern demonstration of what happens when a volcano appears practically on your doorstep.
While I’m busy researching all of that, please take at least a few moments to dip in to these incredible feeds, showing the early stages of this eruption. It’s a terribly beautiful demonstration of the power of the molten interior of our planet.
Here is a TV Canarias/Reuters feed showing the early stages of the eruption:
Spectacular nighttime footage from TV Canarias/Reuters:
An ongoing live feed from TV Canarias/Reuters feed:
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