​The eruption of the Campi Flegrei supervolcano has been talked about in recent decades, as it has shown more and more signs of activity. In fact, signs have appeared since the 1950s, but recently, according to a group of Italian and British volcanologists in a study published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment, the situation is accelerating.

In case you didn’t know, the most powerful eruption of said supervolcano happened about 40,000 years ago. According to estimates, the VEI index would have reached 7 (Volcanic Explosiveness Index) out of a maximum of 8 on the volcanic eruption intensity scale. It has been suggested that the aforementioned super-eruption, doubled by another less intense one in the Caucasus, could have caused the supposed extinction of human populations in Europe at that time (Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens).

In fact, it may have been a decisive factor in the extinction of Neanderthals and the repopulation of Europe by H. sapiens from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, demographic basins that were only partially affected by the super-eruption of the Campi Flegrei volcano and its devastating effects on the climate. However, it should be noted that similar hypotheses regarding the extinction of Neanderthal man are not generally accepted by the scientific community. Importantly, however, there is unanimous agreement on the intensity of said eruption.

Two other major eruptions took place 35,000 and 12,000 years ago, respectively, as evidenced by two concentric calderas located near Naples, in the area where the city of Pozzuoli and its adjacent bay are now located. The last less intense eruption was documented in 1538.

Despite the fact that tens of thousands of earthquakes have been recorded over the past 70 years, their number has increased rapidly in the recent period, experts in the mentioned study report. Last month alone, more than 600 earthquakes were recorded, which is a record for the number of earthquakes that have occurred in one month. In addition, the city of Pozzuoli has been rising at least 10 centimeters per year for the past ten years. Moreover, from 1950 until now, the coastal city has risen by almost four meters.

The study authors acknowledge that their data is only speculative, based on what we know about the signs that precede a volcanic eruption. Of those that precede supereruptions, no one knows how they manifest themselves, since no one has seen supervolcanoes or left records of them.

The aforementioned volcanologists claim that the probability of a super-eruption is still low. A less intense eruption is expected, but regardless of its intensity, the approximately 360,000 people living in the area are still in real danger. Another option would be that things will calm down in Campi Flegrei over time, but that hypothesis seems to be contradicted by the nature of the earthquakes in the area.

If until 2020 they seemed to be formed against the background of displacement of the earth’s crust and its uplift, then after this date the picture seems to indicate rather a rupture of the crust. It is unlikely that experts will be reassured even by the reduction of phenomena there (earthquakes, gas emissions and lifting of the earth’s crust). They mention the case of the Rabaul volcano eruption in Papua New Guinea in 1994, when previous events were reduced to only 10% of what was recorded a decade earlier, and everything seemed to be returning to normal.

Bottom line: an eruption is inevitable. When this will happen, no one knows, but the next decade can be called the most likely period.

Follow our HotNews Science Facebook page for the latest science news and trivia directly in real time!

Photo source: profimediaimages.ro