Mount Vesuvius

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Mount Vesuvius

• Italy

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Located on Italys west coast, Mount Vesuvius
overlooks the Bay and City of Naples and sits in
the crater of the ancient Somma volcano.

• Vesuvius is most famous for the 79 CE eruption
  which destroyed the Roman cities of Pompeii and
  Herculaneum. Though the volcanos last eruption
  was in 1944, it still represents a great danger
  to the cities that surround it, especially the
  busy metropolis of Naples.
• Vesuvius is part of the Campanian
  volcanic arc a line of volcanoes
  that formed over the subduction zone
  created by the convergence of the
  African and Eurasian plates.

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Mount VesuviusGeology and Hazards

• The cone known as Mount Vesuvius began growing
  in the caldera of the Mount Somma volcano, which
  last erupted about 17,000 years ago, and is now
  considered a stratovolcano.
• Most rocks erupted from Vesuvius are andesitic,
  which creates explosive eruptions on a variety of
  scales, making Vesuvius an especially dangerous
  and unpredictable volcano.

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Mount Vesuvius Eruption History

• Mount Vesuvius has experienced eight major
  eruptions in the last 17,000 years.
• The 79 CE eruption is one of the most well known
  ancient eruptions in the world, and may have
  killed more than 16,000 people.
• This eruption destroyed Pompeii, which was one
  of the largest towns in Campania
  with a population of about
  20,000 at the time, and Herculaneum,
  its population then 5000.
• The eruption was proceeded by a larger
  earthquake in 62 CE and repairs were still
  going on when Mt. Vesuvius erupted.
• This eruption had a VEI of 5, and was described
  as a cataclysmic eruption with 3km
  cubed of ejected tephra.

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79 CE Eruption

• Pompeii is famous for the casts the
  hot ash formed around victims
  of the 79 CE eruption. The
  unfortunate people suffocated
  on ash in the air, which then
  covered them and preserved amazing
  details of their clothing and faces.
• organic material vaporized in the
  immense heat (gt500 deg C)
  leaving cavities behind
  excavators filled these with plaster and
  created casts .

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Other Eruptions

• 1631 (considered a sub-Plinian eruption, i.e. not
  as large as 79 CE) had been dormant for 130
  years before the eruption, 4000 people dead
• 1779 explosion with lava fountain 4 km high
• 1794 fissure on the SW flank lava flow to the
  sea destroying Torre del Greco,
• at least 18 deaths
• 1906 April 4-22 , lava fountain 3 km high.
  lava flows on SE flank destroyed the
  town of Boscotrecase, 218 deaths
• 1944 March 18-29, heavy explosions
  lava lake active for 3 days producing
  several lava flows down the slopes,
  28 deaths
• Photo from 1944 eruption