STROMBOLI, Aeolian Islands – Holidaymakers and residents have spent another anxious night on the island of Stromboli after three more volcanic eruptions, police and residents said Friday.

 “It was a sleepless night, also because the volcano didn’t ever stop and it is still very strong, there is smoke rising and there was another small explosion just now. In short, we are not at all calm,” said Gianluca Giuffrè, a resident of Ginostra, a fraction of Stromboli submerged by a rain of ash Thursday evening after the two explosions. 

 “There is a blanket of ash on Ginostra and soon it should also rain. I have the impression that it has not ended here,” Giuffrè added.

 Many tourists fled the island after Wednesday’s strong explosion spewed clouds of ash and spilled lava into the sea.  According to witnesses, the eruption, which occurred at 12:18 p.m. local time, produced a loud roar and ejected lapilli (rock fragments), resulting in fires on the summit area of the volcano and in the Forgia Vecchia district on the built-up slope of Stromboli.

 Other small outbreaks were recorded in the Ginostra area, where many people shielded themselves from falling ash and volcanic material in a church in the tiny hamlet, which can only be reached by sea.

 The most recent eruptions caused a lava flow that fell along the Sciara del Fuoco, a channel on the western side of the volcano from which the river of fire spilled into sea. The glow of the flow is visible several kilometres away. 

 The rain of ash and lava ended some minutes after the explosion.

 An official statement released by the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) confirmed an explosive sequence in the central-southern area occurring at 22:43, with an explosion of lower intensity recorded at 22:29.

 The summit of Stromboli had already been closed to visitors this summer following smaller explosions, one of which was recorded just last week.

 There are currently around 3,000 tourists on Stromboli; less than a hundred are in the small fraction of Ginostra, reachable only by sea. 

 No injuries have been reported but it was in Ginostra on July 3, that an eruption killed Massimo Imbesi, a 35-year-old hiker from Milazzo, Sicily. 

 The latest eruptions follow last week's caution from Dr Eugenio Privitera, director of the Catania branch of the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), who said in a video on the instutute's site that explosions of this kind cannot be predicted and are not preceded by warning signs.

 “Stromboli is a persistently active volcano and that creates a constant volcanic risk,” said Privitera, who also believes an explosion could trigger a tsunami directed towards the Sicilian coast.

 There are around 500 inhabitants on Stromboli, the most northern island in the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Aeolian Island archipelago. 

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