Flights to and from the island of La Palma, in the Spanish Canary archipelago, resumed this Saturday after a 48-hour hiatus due to ash from the eruption of the Cumbre Vieja volcano, a report said. airline and airport authority.
The thick cloud had forced the authorities to close the airport Thursday morning to clean the runways, for the second time since the volcano erupted on September 19.
"La Palma airport is operational again," assured the Spanish airport authority AENA in a tweet.
"Binter has resumed its flight program with the island of La Palma, following an improvement in weather conditions and the ash cloud," for its part announced a few hours later the regional company in a press release.
¡Retomamos la operativa con #LaPalma!
Tras la mejora de las condiciones para volar.
Si vas a viajar, consulta el estado de vuelo en nuestra web.
- Binter (@BinterCanarias) October 9, 2021
The ash spat by the volcano had already caused the closure of the airport on September 25.
Its manager reopened it the next day, but the companies did not resume their flights until four days later.
Concern around an industrial area
The eruption of Cumbre Vieja, which has lasted for almost three weeks, left no people dead or injured, but it resulted in the evacuation of more than 6,000 people, some of whom lost everything under the lava flows, which ravaged 480 ha. Earlier on Saturday, "it seems that part of the cone" of the volcano "collapsed", "paving the way for two new lava flows," volcanologist Stavros Meletlidis of the Institute told RNE radio. Spanish National Geographic (IGN).
The authorities are particularly worried about one of these flows, which carries "a large amount of lava" and approaches an industrial area of the island, where there are warehouses and businesses, explained to the press Miguel Ángel Morcuende, technical director of the Canary Islands Volcanic Emergency Plan (Pevolca).
Experts also warn that the sea advance of nearly 32 ha created by lava solidified in contact with water could collapse, as it has reached the edge of the island's coastal plateau.
Read also Acid fluids, sulfur cloud, "small tsunami" ... should we be worried about the volcanic eruption in La Palma?
As the lava "has reached the edge of the island's coastal shelf, if it continues to advance over a deeper area, collapse could occur, which could be accompanied by the sudden release of gas, d 'explosions of magma and the formation of waves,' explained the director of IGN in the Canaries, María José Blanco, during the same press briefing.
Dozens of low magnitude earthquakes
The coastal shelf is the area that extends from the coast to a depth of about 180 m with a shallow slope, before the seabed plunges to greater depths.
According to the latest photos from the European Copernicus geospatial measurement system, taken before the collapse, lava covered more than 480 ha of land and destroyed at least 1,149 buildings - not all of which are homes.
🌋 # ErupciónLaPalma
Actualización afectación según 🇪🇺 @ CopernicusEMS [# EMSR546] y @CabLaPalma hoy.
30.5 hectáreas es la ganada al mar area
(imagen🛰️ # Sentinel1 de ayer gracias a @sentinel_hub)
ℹ️https: //t.co/FYsNrTHx4y pic.twitter.com/jCffoPoewm
- educación forestal (@eforestal) October 9, 2021
It has also caused great damage to banana plantations, the main activity, along with tourism, of this small island of 85,000 inhabitants of the Canary Islands archipelago, located west of the coast of Morocco.
"Recent lava flows have mainly damaged agricultural areas, 120 ha of crops in total, half of which are banana plantations," Pevolca said on Friday.
Dozens of new low-magnitude earthquakes, up to 4.3 on the Richter scale, have also been recorded in recent days, IGN said on Twitter.
