Where is vesuvius volcano located

Only 17 years old at that time, Pliny wrote two letters to historian Tacitus where he gave the oldest surviving description of a tall tree-shaped cloud that rose above the sky.

He also recounted how many covered their heads and prayed as the sky showered them with pumice, ash, and burned stones. He described how a large umbrella pine cloud loomed over the atmosphere and how the city was eventually engulfed in a horrible cloud. In the letter, he told Tacitus, that his uncle, Pliny The Elder who was a Roman military leader, ordered ships and set sail to hopefully rescue people. He, too, died after getting engulfed in fumes. Many experts believe that Mount Vesuvius is the most dangerous volcano in the world, or at least in the whole of Europe.

It remains an active volcano and will likely erupt someday, although scientists do not know when. A future eruption can endanger the lives of the six million people who inhabit the areas surrounding Vesuvius.

The famous antique site of Pompeii, near Naples. It was completely destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in the background. Pantanal, Brazil. What Is A Plateau? Gambling artifacts found in Herculaneum and a brothel unearthed in Pompeii attest to the decadent nature of the cities. There were smaller resort communities in the area as well, such as the quiet little town of Stabiae.

At noon on August 24, 79 A. Some 2, people stayed in Pompeii, holed up in cellars or stone structures, hoping to wait out the eruption. A westerly wind protected Herculaneum from the initial stage of the eruption, but then a giant cloud of hot ash and gas surged down the western flank of Vesuvius, engulfing the city and burning or asphyxiating all who remained.

This lethal cloud was followed by a flood of volcanic mud and rock, burying the city. The people who remained in Pompeii were killed on the morning of August 25 when a cloud of toxic gas poured into the city, suffocating all that remained. A flow of rock and ash followed, collapsing roofs and walls and burying the dead. Much of what we know about the eruption comes from an account by Pliny the Younger, who was staying west along the Bay of Naples when Vesuvius exploded.

Some bewailed their own fate. Others prayed to die. His uncle, Pliny the Elder, was less lucky. Pliny the Elder, a celebrated naturalist, at the time of the eruption was the commander of the Roman fleet in the Bay of Naples. After Vesuvius exploded, he took his boats across the bay to Stabiae, to investigate the eruption and reassure terrified citizens.

After going ashore, he was overcome by toxic gas and died. Pompeii was buried under 14 to 17 feet of ash and pumice, and the nearby seacoast was drastically changed. Herculaneum was buried under more than 60 feet of mud and volcanic material. Some residents of Pompeii later returned to dig out their destroyed homes and salvage their valuables, but many treasures were left and then forgotten. Archaeologists have long debated whether the mountain actually erupted on August Some have pointed to autumnal fruits discovered in the ruins as a sign that the date is too early.

An inscription uncovered in also suggests the eruption could have taken place two months later in mid-October. In the 18th century, a well digger unearthed a marble statue on the site of Herculaneum. The local government excavated some other valuable art objects, but the project was abandoned.

That is why they call the slopes of Vesuvius the compania felix — the happy land. During the eruption, soldiers and airmen of the th Bomber Group were stationed at the Pompeii Airfield just a few miles from the base of the volcano. Diaries record the awesome sights and sounds they witnessed in this latest major eruption. Guards wore leather jackets and "steel pot" helmets to protect themselves from rains of hot ash and small rocks.

Tents collapsed or caught fire when hot cinders were blown over them. Robert F. McRae wrote in his diary on March 20, , according to the American Geosciences Institute , "As I sit in my tent … I can hear at four- to second intervals the loud rumbling of the volcano on the third day of its present eruption.

The noise is like that of bowling balls slapping into the pins on a giant bowling alley. To look above the mountain tonight, one would think that the world was on fire. The thickly clouded sky glows like that above a huge forest fire. Glowing brighter as new spouts of flame and lava are spewn from the crater. As the clouds pass from across the top of the mountain, the flame and lava can be seen shooting high into the sky to spill over the sides and run in red streams down the slopes.

Today it is estimated that a path of molten lava 1 mile long, half a mile wide, and 8 feet deep is rolling down the mountain. Towns on the slopes are preparing to evacuate.

Our location is, apparently, safe. At any rate no one here, civilian or Army authorities, seems too much worried. Lava has not started to flow down this side of the mountain as yet but is flowing on the other side toward Naples.

On March 22, they were forced to evacuate, leaving behind 88 Allied aircraft. After the volcano subsided, they returned on the 30th to find the planes were a total loss.

Engines were clogged by ash, control panels were useless tangles of fused wire, canopies had holes from flying rock or were etched to opacity by wind driven ash. One airman of the th Bomber Squadron complained in his diary when Axis Sally broadcast a radio show dedicated to the "survivors" of the Vesuvius eruption actually the most severe human casualty was a wrist sprained during the evacuation. She told all of Europe that "Colonel Vesuvius" had destroyed all of them.