A white blanket of snow interrupted by mouths of fire and two long tongues of lava, between which a plume of smoke and ashes rises.
It is the image of Etna, protagonist in these days of a spectacular eruption, immortalized by the Sentinel-2 satellite, one of the sentinels of the planet of the Copernicus program, of the European Commission and the European Space Agency (ESA).
The photo was taken on the morning of February 18, after the second violent lava emission following the suggestive eruptive activity of February 16, which lit up the Catania sunset with colors, projecting lava fountains up to 700 meters above sea level and filling the Sicilian city and other municipalities on the slopes of the volcano of a black carpet of ash and lapilli.
The lava flows, the ESA experts note, have pushed along the southern flanks of Etna for more than a kilometer, until they settle in a natural basin of lava, the Valle del Bove.
The image, explains ESA, "was processed using Sentinel-2's short-wave infrared band, to show the lava flow in bright red."
The satellite's optical instruments and radar, the ESA scholars specify, are "useful for monitoring the phenomena associated with the volcano's activity, such as landslides, cracks in the ground and earthquakes. Atmospheric sensors - they conclude - can also identify gases and the aerosols released by the eruption, and quantify their environmental impact ".
