Mount Etna

The giant

Around 3,350 metres — the height changes with every eruption — and 45 kilometres across: Etna is not a mountain in Sicily, it is a piece of Sicily. It was born half a million years ago underwater, in the gulf that is now the plain of Catania, and has never stopped building and unbuilding itself since. A UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2013, it is one of the most active and most studied volcanoes on the planet, with four summit craters and hundreds of lateral cones. Vineyards, forests and villages grow on its flanks: here the volcano is not a threat, it is a neighbour.

The myth

For the Greeks, beneath the mountain lay Typhon, the hundred-headed monster Zeus crushed with the whole island: when he turns over, the earth trembles; when he breathes, the crater smokes. In its depths Hephaestus, the smith god, forged Zeus’s thunderbolts with the help of the Cyclopes. And here the philosopher Empedocles — who had built an observatory on the volcano — is said to have thrown himself into the crater to prove his divine nature: the Mountain, they say, gave back only one bronze sandal. Every age has told the story of Etna; none has stopped watching her.

The chronicle of fire: the great eruptions

~500,000 years ago

The first submarine eruptions in the pre-Etnean gulf. The pillow lavas of Aci Castello, beneath the Norman castle, are still there to tell the tale.

122 BC

The Plinian eruption that buried Catania in ash. Rome exempted the city from taxes for ten years: history’s first disaster relief.

1669

The Great Eruption: 122 days. The fracture at Nicolosi built the Monti Rossi; lava swallowed fourteen villages, rounded the walls of Catania and quenched its front in the sea. The city rebuilt on that lava is the baroque we see today.

1892

A flank eruption builds the Monti Silvestri: the extinct craters every visitor walks today beside the Rifugio Sapienza.

1928

In two days lava erased Mascali, evacuated house by house. It is the only Etnean town completely destroyed in the twentieth century; it was rebuilt slightly downhill.

1991–1993

The longest of the century: 473 days. To save Zafferana, embankments rose, lava channels were mined and — for the first time anywhere — a river of fire was diverted. The town was spared with the lava front one orchard away.

2002–2003

The «perfect eruption», on two flanks at once. To the north, lava overran Piano Provenzana: the tourist station was reborn, and today you walk on that flow still warm with history.

2021

The year of paroxysms: some sixty lava fountains from the South-East Crater in a few months, ash columns kilometres high, shows visible from Taormina to Syracuse. The cone grew so fast it became the volcano’s new summit.

Today

The INGV watches the Mountain 24/7 with seismographs, GPS, thermal cameras and satellites: it is among the most monitored volcanoes in the world, which is why it can be visited safely. The altitudes you can reach change with the activity — and when the crater lights up, the show from the coast is free.

दो ढलान

एटना दक्षिण — केबल कार और सिल्वेस्त्री

सबके लिए ढलान: 1,900 मीटर पर रिफ़ूजो सापिएंज़ा, सिल्वेस्त्री क्रेटरों की बहुत आसान सैर (8:30–17:00, 5 €), 2,500 मीटर तक केबल कार और लगभग 3,000 मीटर तक 4x4 बस+गाइड वाला 3000 टूर। परिवारों के लिए उपयुक्त।

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एटना उत्तर — पियानो प्रोवेनज़ाना, जंगली ढलान

कम भीड़, ज़्यादा ज्वालामुखी: लिंगुआग्लोस्सा और रागाबो वन से पियानो प्रोवेनज़ाना (1,800 मीटर) तक, 2002 के लावा प्रवाहों के बीच। संचालकों की 4x4 गाड़ियाँ 10:30, 12:00 और 13:30 बजे निकलकर 2,920 मीटर तक जाती हैं — और सूर्यास्त पर वह सैर है जो कभी नहीं भूलती (69–79 €, गाइड शामिल)।