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Santorini, probably the most popular tourist destinations in Greece, could soon be swamped by volcanic eruptions and tsunamis.
The island has been rattled by 6,400 minor and moderate earthquakes this week, sometimes only minutes between each quake.
Greece’s government declared a state of emergency yesterday, with some 10,000 islanders fleeing from the near-constant tremors.
A 5.2 magnitude earthquake shook Santorini on Wednesday – essentially the most powerful recorded since seismographs began wobbling on January 26.
The epicentres of the earthquakes are near the underwater volcano Kolumbo about five miles northeast of the island.
Officials haven’t linked the recent seismic activity to Kolumbo or the dormant volcano inside Santorini’s caldera, Nea Kameni.
But some geologists say that the tremors which have torn through the Aegean region could possibly be because Kolumbo is about to blow.
The last time Kolumbo experienced a significant eruption was 1650, coughing out ash seen as distant as Turkey. Pyroclastic flows – fast-moving, searingly hot clouds of volcanic ash and gases – killed 70 people.
Scientists doubt there shall be a repeat of this, or of the 1956 Amorgos earthquake, which reached a magnitude of seven.8 and killed 53 people.
Tectonic plates – huge pieces made from the planet’s crust – pull apart, crash together and slide past one another, causing earthquakes.
Santorini is perched on the tectonically energetic southern Aegean Sea, meaning the present quakes could possibly be brought on by the plates chaffing, possibly irritating the volcanic system coursing across the island.
Geology professor Avraam Zelilidis, of the University of Patras, suggested the swarm of quakes is as a consequence of volcanic rumblings.
‘Since the seismic activity has intensified and stabilised within the last 4 days, it shows that the earthquakes are related to the volcano,’ Zelilidis told SKAI, a Greek TV network.
Costas Synolakis, who studies natural hazards on the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, said he’s ‘99% certain’ Kolumbo will erupt.
‘Santorini has began ringing bells, we could have a small explosion and a tsunami,’ he said, warning if an eruption occurs, the volcano could collapse into the ocean and push out tsunamis.
‘What I fear is that when a tsunami hits, people sit and film with their cameras, as a substitute of moving away,’ he added to Live News.
While earthquakes can occur with next to no warnings, volcanoes are inclined to put out some warning signs before they erupt. Magma elbows its way through rock in such a way that it causes distinctive sorts of quakes, deforming the land because it ascends.
Magma – molten rock – is oozing in a recently discovered chamber beneath the Kolumbo volcano.
But Michele Paulatto, a complicated research fellow in volcano geophysics, strikes a far different tone.
‘There was some slight increase in activity at Kolumbo volcano and Santorini volcano, enough to warrant close inspection, but not enough to boost the volcanic alert level,’ he told Forbes.
‘Earthquakes can trigger eruptions, but I’m unaware of that taking place at Kolumbo or Santorini. The earthquakes have mostly been away from the volcanoes.’
Paulattoo added that if seismic activity increases in the times ahead, an eruption could be more likely.
Civil protection officials are monitoring Santorini’s volcanic activity and said ‘plainly there may be a gentle seismovolcanic excitation’.
‘It is a phenomenon that the state has been informed about, has taken measures, it’s a really slow phenomenon, and we must distinguish it from what is going on now,’ Costas Papazachos, professor of lithosphere physics, seismology and applied geophysics on the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, said.
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