MOLTEN STREAMS

Evening Star, Issue 26041, 4 March 1947, Page 7

MOLTEN STREAMS

MOUNT ETNA EROPTIOH

INCREASINGLY GRAVE SITUATION

i ROME, March 2. Three new craters in the northern side of Mount Etna added more fastmoving incandescent lava to the molten streams again threatening adjacent villages. The aotivity of the volcano increased this morning. Reports from Messina said the volume of lava had increased alarmingly. Bad wteather prevented aerial observation.

Mount Etna is causing an increasingly grave situ ait on, says the ‘ Daily Telegraph’s ’ Catania correspondent. Although no lives have been lost, the damage to cultivation is estimated at almost £1,000,000. Every yard ,of the lava’s progress spells annihilation to more of the vineyards on the mountain’s lower slopes. The main stream has crossed the 1879 lava bed, arid is creeping into the first belts of cultivation. The lava )s advancing in a white lyot. wave, sometimes 10ft high. Jt halts as it meets a check until pressure is built up, when it goes forward again. Trees and fences dissolve in flame, and rocks crack and crumble.

Two separate flows of lava have joined, and are advancing down the slopes of Mount Etna on a combined front of over 300yds. The lava has overtaken one village, and 1 27 more families, who are directly threatened, have left* their homes. The director of, the Mount Etna observatory daringly ascended the mountaiu and penetrated to a spoCnear the central crater, and brought back a, feport that the danger may increase.