Eager tourists are flocking to Mount Etna in Sicily to observe impressive eruptions on the volcano, but local officials are actually asking them to knock it off, saying their looky-loo ways are hampering rescue services and the emergency response.
Mount Etna’s first 2025 eruption intensified over the weekend, producing substantial lava flows that cut through the mountain’s deep snowpack and prompted 1000’s of tourists to climb up the Sicilian slope to get a greater look.
Lava flows from a fracture on Mount Etna during an eruption of the volcano on Feb. 14, 2025.
Etna Walk/AFP via Getty Images
In a post to Facebook on Sunday, Sicily’s head of regional civil protection, Salvo Cocina, described how narrow streets resulting in the volcano have been filled with parked cars and traffic jams, making it almost unattainable for emergency vehicles to access the location.
He also wrote that 4 people, none of whom were seriously injured, were rescued on Sunday. And within the overnight hours between Sunday and Monday, other people were rescued, including a lady who reportedly had a “panic attack,” all of whom weren’t properly equipped or prepared for the tour.
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The mayor of Adrano, certainly one of the communities closest to the newest eruption, even issued an order over the weekend prohibiting anyone from getting inside 500 metres of the lava flow.
A view of Mount Etna seen from Adrano, Catania, which is producing a brand new eruption, on Feb. 14, 2025.
Salvatore Allegra/Anadolu via Getty Images
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the order has been largely ignored. A whole bunch of videos have been posted to social media, reports The Guardian, showing curious onlookers getting inside centimetres of the lava flows — and even some people skiing alongside one large molten river.
“I’ve seen many photos and videos of individuals dangerously close to the front, even skiing,” Carlo Caputo, the mayor of nearby town Belpasso, told The Guardian. “Though visually striking, it exposes them to serious risks, because the lava, interacting with the snow, can immediately vapourize it and, with the thermal energy released, may violently hurl fragments or rocks.”
A view of Mount Etna seen from Adrano, Catania, which is producing a brand new eruption on Feb. 11, 2025.
Salvatore Allegra/Anadolu via Getty Images
Mount Etna is understood to erupt continuously, and as of Feb. 11, a brand new fissure had opened up on the southwest Bocca Nuova crater, bringing multiple lava flows to the surface. By Monday, ash emissions from the crater had change into so thick that air traffic around Sicily was disrupted and dozens of flights from Catania Airport diverted.
As of Monday, the lava had advanced about 4 kilometres down the slope, Italian news outlet Il Post reports.
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