Skier glides down Mount Etna as volcano erupts in the background

London: Mount Etna has been gearing up for 2026 with a bang – or, actually, several of them – with days of explosive activity, bringing lava fountains, loud booms and eruption columns that launched dark clouds of ash into the sky.

On Saturday (Sunday AEDT), a lone skier was captured on video gliding down the bright white slopes as Etna, Europe’s largest active volcano, put on quite a display in the background.

The latest volcanic activity began on Wednesday, when monitors detected a change in Etna’s usual signals, including volcanic tremors, changes in the Earth’s surface and infrasonic activity, Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology said.

The institute said that after years of “rather modest activity”, Etna’s north-east crater, the oldest of the volcano’s four main summit craters, made “its presence felt” – almost 28 years after its last major eruption.

The volcanic activity intensified on Thursday and Friday, causing ejections of incandescent material above the crater rim, the institute said. Worsening weather throughout Friday night triggered “strong reddish flashes” among the clouds, along with repeated booms that could be heard along the slopes.

Activity on Etna “increased very suddenly”, the institute said, noting that the episode produced 300- to 400-metre lava jets and an eruption column loaded with rock fragments, which rose a few kilometres above the summit of Etna and were pushed west by the wind.

Etna is a popular tourist destination all year, with its snowy landscape and frequent volcanic activity attracting photographers, hikers and winter sports enthusiasts despite frequent eruptions and lava flows. Footage showed dozens of skiers continuing to summit Etna on Sunday as smoke rose in the background.

Following an eruption earlier this year, officials urged visitors to stop approaching running lava, calling the natural phenomenon “extremely dangerous”.