Etna’s flaming eruptions seen from space (satellite photos)

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Mount Etna erupts, seen from space on February 18, 2021. (Image credit: Landsat data from the US Geological Survey)

Mount Etna has been spitting lava through Sicily for weeks in a series of eruptions captured by a multitude of satellites orbiting Earth.

Etna, the most active volcano in all of Europe, has erupted since 2011. The last series began on February 16. The volcano erupted that day, again on February 18, and then again between February 20 and 23. During these eruptions, lava fountains spouted high into the night sky, reaching 0.7 miles high earlier in the month and reaching 1.5 miles above the volcano’s summit later in the month.

These most recent eruptions “were among the most violent in the young history of the Southeast Crater,” Marco Neri, a volcanologist at the Italian National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology, said in a NASA statement.

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Earth observation satellites were keen to check the smoke, ash and lava released from the volcano. On February 18, the Operational Land Imager (OLI) of the NASA-US Geological Survey Landsat 8 satellite captured a natural color view of the volcano, which was overlaid with infrared data to show hot areas (or places where lava had pierced.).

In this image taken from space, you can see Mount Etna in Italy, one of the most active volcanoes around the world, erupting. The image was captured on February 18 by the European Space Agency’s Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission, made up of two different orbiting Earth observation satellites. The volcano erupted twice in less than 48 hours, spewing ash and spouting a lava fountain, erupting on February 16 and then again on February 18. (Image credit: Contains modified Copernicus Sentinel (2021) data, processed by ESA, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO)

Also on February 18, the European Space Agency’s Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission, made up of two satellites, observed the eruption. European satellites captured a moment which, using infrared imagery, showed the lava in bright orange and red.

Mount Etna erupting on February 23, 2021, seen by VIIRS on NOAA-20.

Mount Etna erupting on February 23, 2021, seen by VIIRS on NOAA-20. (Image credit: NASA Earth Observatory Image by Joshua Stevens, using VIIRS day-night band data from the Joint Polar Satellite System)

A few days later, as Etna erupted again on February 23, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s NOAA-20 satellite took an image with its Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument. which highlights the plumes coming from the volcano.

Landsat 8 captured a nighttime image of activity at #MtEtna on February 25, 2021. This image uses thermal and shortwave infrared bands (bands 10, 7, 6) to show the thermal signature of the lava. pic.twitter.com/ryTDbKw0nAMarch 1, 2021

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Landsat 8 observed the volcano again on February 25, this time overnight. Using thermal and short-wave infrared bands, he was able to show the lava below based on the heat it gave off.

While these recent eruptions were impressive, they caused minor disturbance rather than major damage to the surrounding area, according to the NASA statement. The ash from Mount Etna temporarily closed Catania airport and was deposited across Sicily, for example, and local residents had to deal with falling ash and rocks.

Email Chelsea Gohd at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter @chelsea_gohd. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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