Mt Etna - is it so Gentle?

Yesterday, our guide sold us the line that Mt Etna was a gentle giant... which we took at face value... in respect of his position of authority (leading our walk across the craters' edge)... and lack of any contradictory evidence. Well, some evidence to the contrary is now showing itself... perhaps not pointing to the volcano being a killer... but pointing to recent form... that is a little too recent to be comfortable.

Our discomfort comes from further searching for information regarding the 2013 eruption... say the year quickly enough and no more questions need be asked. But today, we learned these eruptions were in June 2013... 1st of June to be exact... some 6 weeks ago... 40 days ago! They didn't tell us that before they sold us the entry tickets. We saw a photo of the square in the town of Zafferana Etnea covered with black ash... inches deep... in the exact spot where we had our coffee, yesterday morning. Other photos showed red-hot ash being flung out of a crater... great photos... but not consistent with the gentle giant assertion.

We had been critical of the grime evident outside our gate... all the properties looked like they needed a fresh coat of paint... all the windowsills needed a good wash down. But what highlighted the grime was black sooty deposits accumulated in the gutters and corners of buildings. This black sooty deposit looked much like the ash we were walking on while in the crater area of Mt Etna. In all likelihood, our apartment received a good sprinkling of ash from last month's eruptions.

We have been having afternoon thunderstorms in the last few days... claps louder than Australian claps... relative to the strength of the lightning. We have been amusing ourselves asking questions regarding the role high mountains may play in increasing the potency of lightning and thunder. We questioned if the large amount of steam arising from the cooling volcanic ash may somehow be a catalyst to increasing the electrical charge in the cloud. We theorised if large raindrops are colder (on average) than small raindrops. Oh... the carefree days of innocence. Now when we hear the thunder, our only question is, "was that thunder or was it the volcano?"