The Cumbre Vieja volcano on the island of La Palma surprised the inhabitants of the Canary Islands in Spain by erupting last Sunday. At 15:12 local time, after a swarm of earthquakes, the volcano, which had been dormant for half a century, finally erupted. Lava has devoured some houses, although fortunately a massive evacuation was called in time and no injuries have been caused by the transit of the incandescent material.
Although the last eruption on La Palma before this incident occurred in 1971, the island itself emerged from the depths as a result of the activity of the Earth’s magma; that is, La Palma is an island of volcanic origin. The eruption of a submarine volcano located 4 thousand meters below sea level led to the birth of La Palma, located in the Canary Islands. Therefore, it is an area where this type of activity is usual, and the records show it.
Among its region, it is the area with the highest number of eruptions, historically. According to the National Geographic Institute, 16 eruptions have been recorded in the Canary Islands since 1470. Seven of these occurred in La Palma, followed by Tenerife with five and Lanzarote and El Hierro with two each. The last activity of this type occurred in 2011 precisely in El Hierro.
In the eruption registered last Sunday, the lava infiltrated between the houses of the island, showing nature’s force might. Although Nemesio Pérez, coordinator of the Instituto Vulcanólogo de Canarias, pointed out that it is improbable that the eruption left dead people, he indicated that the lava, which advances at an average speed of 700 meters per hour, “will devastate everything where it passes.” The lava flow spewed by the volcano has, so far, an average height of six meters and is advancing at the speed of a person walking. It is also estimated that Cumbre Vieja releases between 6,000 and 9,000 tons of sulfur dioxide daily.
The damage caused by the Cumbre Vieja volcano, in La Palma, is expected to be only material, although it is not known how long the natural event could last. Until the eruptive dynamics of Cumbre Vieja are not clear, it won’t be possible to estimate the time it will take for the activity of the volcano to cease. In the history of the Canary Islands, there have been eruptions that have taken up to two thousand days, as happened in 1704 in Tenerife. Although experts have indicated that this would not be the case and it is expected that sulfur dioxide levels will decrease in the coming weeks.
How many active volcanoes are there in the world?
Given this scenario, it is inevitable to wonder how many active volcanoes there are in the world. Although there are more than a hundred of them around the globe, there is a list of those that are most likely to erupt. Some of them have spewed incandescent matter in the last months and are kept under surveillance. Besides Cumbre Vieja, these are the most active volcanoes in the world that could erupt.
Text and photos courtesy of Ecoosfera
Translated by María Isabel Carrasco Cara Chards