LAVA STREAM

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20184, 28 June 1928, Page 7

LAVA STREAM

VESUVIUS IN ACTION Spectacular Display by H.tienc Mountain CONTINUAL EXPLOSIONS ERUPTIVE CONE RAISED £,/ Telegraph—Per Press Assn.—Copyright ] [ Australian Press Assn. I Received June 27, 10 p.m. SOME, June 27. Mount Vesuvius is erupting spectacularly, and there are continual explosions which have launched masses of incadescent lava. The cone has been raised level with the great crater which crumbled away on April 6, 1906. Vesuvius, the most striking object seen from the Bay of Naples, is an active volcano which has been studied for so Jong, and so thoroughly, that it is perhaps the best known volcano in the world, serving as a type for the popular conception of such a mountain. It is encircled on the north and ease by a lofty cliff. Monte Somma, which indicates the site of a much larger prehistoric volcano. The latter —Mons Summanus of antiquity, once crowned by the Temple of Jupiter, was the seat of volcanic activity long before A esuvius, which first in 63 A.D. became convulsed by earthquakes repeated at intervals till 79, in which year occurred its earliest known eruption, resulting in the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum. was follows! by others of which the more memorable are that in 472, when its ashes alighted in Constantinople; in 512 when they were wafted to Tripoli; and several others until the J Sth century which witnessed many severe eruptions. Another memorable outbreak was that of 1822. when the so-called smoke from the crater rose to a height of 10,000 feet, emitting flashes of lightning, raining torrents of hot water, and flooding the •villages of San Sebastiano and Massa. In 1855 a terrible eruption occurred, and in December 1861 Torre del Greco suffered severely by another visitation surpassed in turn by that of 1871-18/2, when a sudden eruption resulted in the death of 20 people. The eruption of April. 1906. was even more terrible, the weight of the dust being sufficient to crush the roof of a market as far away as Naples. The top of the crater removed and the mountain lias not been so picturesque since. Prom that date till the present there have been several emissions, all of rather mild intensity. Vesuvius is famous as an attraction to tourists, who are taken to the crater bv a funicular railway constructed in 1880.