A German research vessel has discovered three previously unknown underwater volcanoes off Sicily. Further investigations will show how dangerous these can be for people.
Catania – The south of Italy is, along with Iceland, the region in Europe that has the most active volcanoes. Well-known are Vesuvius near Naples and the neighboring supervolcano of the Phlegraean Fields, whose imminent eruption is feared. Etna, which is currently erupting, is well known in and around Sicily. North of Sicily, the island volcano Stromboli is permanently active, its neighboring islands Lipari and Vulcano are also volcanoes that are only dormant. South of Sicily, the islands of Lampedusa, Linosa and Pantelleria are also dormant volcanoes.
But the Sicilian waters are also peppered with volcanoes beneath the sea surface, such as Marsili, one of the largest and most dangerous volcanoes in Europe. During an international scientific expedition by the German research vessel Meteor in July and August, three more large underwater volcanoes were discovered, as well as underwater hot springs and a shipwreck. This was reported by the National Institute for Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics (OGS) in Sgonico near Trieste.
The new volcanoes in southern Italy are over six kilometers wide
According to the OGS, the new volcanoes are at least six kilometers wide and rise more than 150 meters above the sea floor. They are the continuation of other volcanic cones that the OGS had already discovered in 2019 in the sea area between the towns of Mazara del Vallo and Sciacca in southwest Sicily. The wreck was discovered by chance during seabed mapping carried out during the expedition and its position was reported to the Italian maritime authorities. It is a 100 meter long and 17 meter wide ship that lies on an unnamed sea bank at a depth of 110 meters halfway between the volcanic island of Linosa and Sicily.
Now the three underwater volcanoes should be examined more closely. Due to the difficulty of access, underwater volcanism has hardly been researched so far. The participants in the expedition collected rock samples from the volcanoes – lava rock and pumice deposits – which are now being analyzed. It is hoped that this will provide information about the age of the volcanoes and the properties of the magma.
“This information will be fundamental for reconstructing the geological history of one of the most complex regions of the central Mediterranean,” promises Giulia Matilde Ferrante, researcher from the Geophysics Section of the OGS, who took part in the expedition. “This clearly shows how little is known about the seabed, even near the coast,” adds Jonathan Ford, a colleague from the same OGS research group.
Underwater volcanoes in Italy pose an incalculable risk
The volcanoes that have now been discovered could – like all underwater volcanoes worldwide – pose a danger. The problem is particularly serious when the volcanoes are located at shallow sea depths. Near Pantelleria, for example, there is the underwater volcano Empedocles, from which the volcanic island of Ferdinandea temporarily rose in 1831, which soon sank again.
Eruptions from underwater volcanoes can trigger tsunamis if they are close enough to the surface. This happened in 2022 with the eruption of the underwater volcano near Tonga, when tsunamis devastated the region’s coasts and resulted in four deaths. The shock waves after the eruption traveled around the earth; according to NASA, the explosion had the explosive power of around ten megatons of TNT – more than 500 times the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.
The Greek underwater volcano Kolumbos claimed around 50 lives in September 1650 when earthquakes and tsunamis devastated the neighboring island of Santorini. The ash rain brought agriculture and livestock farming to a standstill. The collapse of the caldera volcano triggered a tsunami that caused damage to islands 150 kilometers away. By the way, Kolumbos is still considered active.
#dangerous #people