BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Earth Sci.
Sec. Geoscience and Society
This article is part of the Research TopicEffective Communication of Volcanic Hazards for Risk Mitigation in Urban AreasView all articles
Investigation into Etna's summit effusive activity by correlating satellite-derived erupted volumes and strain response
Provisionally accepted
Alessandro Bonaccorso1
Luigi Carleo2*
Annalisa Cappello1
Marco Aloisi1
Giuseppe Bilotta1
Flavio Cannavo'1
Gilda Maria Currenti1
Antonino Sicali1
Gaetana Ganci1- 1Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia Osservatorio Etneo, Catania, Italy
- 2National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology, Section of Catania, Catania, Italy
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Over the past 20 years, Etna’s South-East Crater (SEC) has been the most active of the summit craters, producing more than 100 lava fountains and several effusive eruptions. The latter, lasting from days (effusive pulses) to tens of days (more prolonged effusive phases), occur frequently and thus require accurate volume estimation. Such eruptions usually produce small deformations (≤1 microstrain) that can be detected by the high-precision borehole dilatometers installed at Etna. Recently, a linear correlation has been found between strain changes and eruption volumes derived from satellite imagery for lava fountains. This study extends the previous findings by incorporating data from the SEVIRI satellite sensor, showing a proportionality between strain and volume also for the effusive pulses. Our study confirms that combining satellite and ground-based data enables real-time volcanic monitoring and volume estimation. This enhances the understanding of eruption dynamics and mass balance efficiency, therefore also contributing to the correct and effective communication of volcanic hazards.
Keywords: Etna volcano, Borehole strainmeters, Satellite thermal data, Effusive eruptions, volcanic hazard
Received: 19 Sep 2025; Accepted: 12 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Bonaccorso, Carleo, Cappello, Aloisi, Bilotta, Cannavo', Currenti, Sicali and Ganci. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Luigi Carleo, luigi.carleo@ingv.it
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