The San Roque hailstorm. Albacete, 1859.

/ 16/08/2024

Lately, I’ve been busy with a project that has precluded me from posting in VolcanoCafe. I have wanted to post about the ongoing awakening of Kilauea’s East Rift Zone, but that will have to wait for now. Instead, I thought of posting something about what I’ve been working on lately. For reasons, I’ve found it interesting to document historical large hail events in Spain, and today is the anniversary of one of the largest storms in terms of hail size in Spain if not the world even. This storm, locally known as the “Pedrisco de San Roque”, took place on 16 August 1859, in the province capital of Albacete. I fished it out of oblivion by looking into old, historical digitized newspapers. There is at least some relation to volcanoes, so it’s not entirely off-topic, and there have been floods and earthquakes in VolcanoCafé before, so why not hail?

Indeed, hail is not as dramatic or deadly as hurricanes, or tornadoes, or floods, which are far, far better documented in contemporary literature. But they are a very relevant meteorological phenomenon that has been very prominent in the more rural world of many decades past when a summer hailstorm could ruin the crops of a village and drown it in poverty. Old newspapers dedicated much time to hail despite their much more limited space than current news. Back then, it seemed more present as people were more familiar with hail and its detrimental effects. So here is a story about a particularly remarkable hail event from 165 years ago.

Geologic setting

The area of Albacete is home to an interesting volcano-tectonic history, so while we are at it we might well look into it. SE Spain is actually a subduction zone. Europe has some of these stealthy little-known subduction zones, or pseudo-subduction zones, that are sort of stuck but still have oceanic slabs hanging down into the mantle. One of them is the Caucasus, where stratovolcanoes with typical subduction zone chemistry are found, like Elbrus or Kazbek. A less volcanic one is the Carpathians, with subduction beneath the eastern side of the mountain range, and another “typical” albeit weak stratovolcano which is Ciomadul. Yet another zone is the Gibraltar slab, a sheet of Atlantic crust subducted underneath the Gibraltar Strait and going down several hundred kilometers into the mantle. I don’t fully understand all the complexities in the area, but I expect all of this pull continues to try and move some stuff around, so probably has something to do with the Great Lisbon Earthquake of 1755. The area is not presently volcanic, but until recently (geologic scale recent) there was a volcanic arc in the area, a very small one at that, but a volcanic arc.

Map with places mentioned.

In the Mediterranean Sea closest to the Gibraltar Strait, a series of submarine stratovolcanoes grew. Arc volcanoes also formed on the coasts of Spain and Morocco. In Spain, the main volcano was a volcanic field on the southern coast of the country, the Cabo de Gata volcanic field. Cabo de Gata volcanism was typical subduction zone calc-alkaline chemistry, although a relatively weak volcano. It was active from about 13 Ma to 8 Ma (million years ago). I have never been, but despite heavy erosion, I expect lava domes, pyroclastic deposits, and intrusion exposures must be outstanding in the arid landscape of SE Spain. After the Cabo de Gata volcanism, there was a phase of intraplate volcanic activity that lasted from about 8 Ma to 6 Ma. This phase yielded small monogenetic volcanoes over a wide area of SE Spain, but with the curiosity that they erupted exotic magmas of “lamproite” affinity.

What are lamproites? I don’t know too well, and I’m not sure anyone does. These magmas are weird. Very weird. They are a vast family that belongs to the larger family of ultrapotassic volcanism, very common around the Mediterranean. Ultrapotassic is a variant of the yet larger family of alkaline volcanism, but with the particularity of having a lot of potassium and little sodium, sometimes making very explosive caldera volcanoes, having isotopic compositions that generally point at heavy contamination of ancient continental crust, and happening around subduction and collision zones. The mainland Italy volcanoes are the foremost occurrence of ultrapotassic volcanism in the world (like Vesuvius, Campi Flegrei, or Colli Albani), and there is also the relevant example of the active Gölcuk caldera in Turkey.

Spain’s ultrapotassic volcanism is very minimalistic and just comprises some sparse, isolated, monogenetic volcanoes. The magmas are so odd though, mineralogically and chemically speaking, that various names: fortunites, verites, jumillites, and cancarixites, were coined exclusively to classify the SE Spain lamproitic lavas. Lamproites are unusual in that they can be high in magnesium and high in silica at the same time, so sort of being primitive and evolved simultaneously. They can rise straight from very deep, in fact in cratons lamproites can carry diamonds, as in Australia. Maybe they can even be compared to effusive kimberlites with more viscous lavas. They are rare, none are known to have erupted historically. 8 Ma Piton de Cancarix is the most prominent example in SE Spain, a dome or plug with columnar jointing that crowns the top of a hill.

Other minor volcanism has continued in the SE Spain area very sporadically and will probably continue. Regular intraplate volcanism. For example, a single volcanic cone in Cofrentes that is 1-2 million years old, or the volcanic field of Campo de Calatrava, which continues to degas magmatic CO2 at present.

The San Roque hail of 1859

Amid this geologically alive area lies the city of Albacete, capital to the province of the same name and stage to a massive hailstorm this day, August 16, 165 years ago. It had 16,000 inhabitants at the time. The reason for this area’s storm activity is also rooted in geology, particularly the Africa-Europe collision. Collision has pushed much of Spain into elevated mesas and mountain ranges and closed the Mediterranean, turning the sea into a remarkably hot and salty mass of water. In summer, radiation from the Sun heats the high areas of the Spanish interior where air rises and pulls more air inwards on the surface so that moist unstable air of Mediterranean origin can then blow from the coast towards the highlands. Albacete is found in one of such breeze areas. When cold air in high levels of the atmosphere associated with lows or cut-off lows moves over Spain it can interact with the moist hot air and trigger intense thunderstorms. Air blowing in different directions at different altitudes, the westward Mediterranean breeze on the surface versus the eastward winds spinning around the low, combine to produce rotating thunderstorms known as supercells, which over the rough, complicated topography of Spain have it hard to narrow their updraft (ascending winds) into tornadoes, but are very proficient at producing giant hail. Every year several supercells bring hail exceeding 5 cm in diameter to eastern Spain. These are somewhat similar to volcanic plumes, both thunderstorms and volcanic plumes can keep fragments of solid material suspended in the air because of their intense rising air currents, one drops chunks of ice, the other chunks of rock, but in the end, both are types of falling projectiles that can shatter crystals, damage roofs, or injure people. Of course, the ice melts away, and the rock does not, but both come from strong currents of rising air.

There are two sources with detailed information on the San Roque hail that I’ve found. First, is the newspaper from Albacete city “La Semana”, I haven’t read the original news, but the text is reproduced in many other Spanish news a few days after the storm. Second, is a letter from an Albacete habitant sent to Madrid which via personal contacts made it to the Madrid newspaper·“El Clamor Público”. According to these sources, it’s possible to get a fairly good idea of the events. At about four and a half in the afternoon, an unusual sound could be heard in the city, it was similar to a train, but people did not know where it came from. Unbeknownst to the inhabitants, a powerful thunderstorm was approaching and already carried gigantic hail that, as it impacted the ground, made a deep, sustained noise that carried to a distance ahead of the storm. This noise is called hail roar. Around five in the afternoon, some fragments of hail started to fall over the city, and ten minutes later, a shower of hail and water unleashed in full force. As translated from the El Clamor letter:

“The first hailstone that fell in the house, or rather that we saw, was in the patio: it broke into five pieces each like a lemon: the ones that hit the wooden shed felt like cannon shots. The pieces that broke on the opposite wall and on the paving have destroyed the windows of the balconies (…) Tomorrow or the next day I will have to re-til it, because the roofs look like a pile of ruins.”

When large hailstones fall on hard surfaces, they shatter into smaller pieces, and from the letter the secondary fragments propelled to the sides were large enough to shatter windows. The size of the hail may have been gigantic, as we will see later, and this resulted in heavy damage. La Semana gives some examples of the mayhem that the falling fragments of ice caused in the city. Hailstones caused severe injury to the heads of some people, knocking a man unconscious, and also killed sheep because of serious head damage. The hailstones shattered crystals and roof tiles and also caused some remarkable damage to the roofs of the city:

“In the barracks, a hailstone of such enormous size fell that it shattered a ceiling beam, and the people who were found inside fled in terror to the basements and caves to take refuge. At the Institute, more than thirty holes have been opened in the roof. In many houses, which we do not detail because it would take too much time, the hailstones have made large holes, especially in the roofs and sheds of little resistance.”

The matter of the size

According to La Semana: 

“With regard to the size of the hailstones, everything we say is unbelievable because we ourselves would never have believed that stones larger than eggs had fallen, and on Tuesday we saw them nine inches in diameter and weighing three pounds and two and a half ounces. Stones weighing two pounds, and pound and pound and a half in weight have been found in many garbage dumps.”

And according to the letter in El Clamor:

“Some 33-ounce stones and many 20-ounce stones have been weighed after the storm ended. In a house in Plazuela del Hospital they had the serenity to weigh one that got into the doorway in the middle of the storm, weighing 4 pounds minus two ounces.”

What makes the storm so interesting is the mentioned size of the hail which would be among the largest overall reported events worldwide, and above the records considered by “World Weather and Climate Extremes Archive”, which however is either not aware of some bigger reports or has disregarded them because of the measure not being verified by scientists when taken. The units used in Albacete are the same Castilian units that were in use historically over most of Spain. A Castilian pound is 460 g, an ounce 28.75 g, and an inch 2.32 cm. I’m not sure how the distance was taken but weights were widely measured at the time with scales because of the need to measure amounts of food or other materials, but I’m no expert in this and if anyone reading the article knows something about late 19th-century measuring scales I’d be more than interested into any insight. People were curious to know the size of hail, and having no cameras or mobile phones to record images and share them, the information consisted instead of measuring weights, which was a very common practice for hail in Europe and the world until 2000 or so when visual media gradually kicked in and information got better but worse at the same time, and now hail weight measurements by people is a very rare thing to see.

The point is that La Semana describes stones as up to ~21 cm in diameter and 1450 g in weight, few details are given though, like if the measures correspond to the same stone or not, or when or where it was collected, but both values are quite exceptional. The letter in El Clamor gives details for a 1770 g hailstone collected while the storm was happening that entered a doorway. The record hail weight recognized by the “World Weather and Climate Extremes Archive” is 1020 g in Bangladesh in 1986. When I mentioned this news before people, they were interested but I only got to know the opinion of two meteorologists who thought the values were too high to be correct. On the one hand, the values are indeed very high. On the other though, two different sources roughly coincide in the weight, and old sources of information tend to be more reliable than contemporary news sources. I have worked before with Hawaiian newspapers from around the same time, from 1868, for the article regarding the Mauna Loa eruption of 1868, and found them to be reliable, similar to how I feel about weather news in Spanish newspapers when handling them. The damage to roofs with many holes opened through some of them I think is suggestive of many stones weighing around 500 grams, which coincides with the statement of 20-ounce stones (~600 g) being numerous as mentioned El Clamor, below 500 g I think it would be very difficult for them to fully puncture roofs. But of course, this is not a debate that will be settled immediately, and it has merely started.

Regardless of the exact size of the hail, it was quite big and reminds me of how houses near Ruang got holes in their roofs during the volcanic eruption earlier this year. Isn’t it amazing how nature often parallels itself in very different things? Well, I hope I can return to volcanoes soon and drop a much-needed update on Kilauea, I’m also traveling to Etna towards the end of the month and maybe I’ll feel inspired and write an Etna-something.

 

References

La Paz (Murcia). 20 August 1859. Page 1. https://prensahistorica.mcu.es/es/catalogo_imagenes/grupo.do?path=1000100478&posicion=1&presentacion=pagina

El Clamor público (Madrid). 19 August 1859. Page 3. https://hemerotecadigital.bne.es/hd/es/viewer?id=0afe57a9-8001-4209-8253-f8e0e562348b&page=3

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422 thoughts on “The San Roque hailstorm. Albacete, 1859.”

    • Deflation is showing on many stations now. Some more than others.

    • Here’s your data, assess this:

      Showing only M1+

      I don’t really know how to interpret this either, but it’s significantly higher post-eruption activity than in any previous eruption .. if my memory serves me right.

      • Understanding the quake data isn’t that hard. This eruption created a new dyke to the north. Creating a dyke is noisy business. The M4.1 and M3.3 are trigger quakes, caused by strain generated by the expanding dyke. A lot of the M2 quakes are aftershocks of the M4.1 and trace a NNW oriented strike-slip fault.

        What IMO is unsure of how to interpret is the GPS data. The rifting, the expanding dyke and the deflating sill all generate ground movements that are registered in real time by the instruments. It’s difficult to separate the individual sources from the mix, and as the instruments show continuing ground deformation it’s not easy to say with confidence what will happen next.

  4. A 3.3 near Keilir this morning.
    The expansion of the dyke northwards seems to have settled down. At one point I was beginning to think that future episodes might threaten the airport road near Vogar.

  6. Like every single other time the one night I dont check the cams I miss the start 🙁 seems to be a remarkable amount of seismicity post eruption, any ideas on what might cause this? Is the sill spilling its guts completely?

    • It created a new dyke that went further north this time. That’s why it generated more quakes than the last couple of eruptions.

    • From IMO:

      “Updated 23. August at 10:00 UTC

      The vigor of the eruption has decreased somewhat since its peak yesterday.

      The activity is now mostly confined to two fissures, the northern end of the fissure that erupted first and the fissure that opened north of the first one.

      Seismicity decreased rapidly after 4 A.M. However, ground extension continues north of Stóra-Skógfell, which suggests that the eruption has not reached equilibrium”

      source: https://en.vedur.is/about-imo/news/volcanic-unrest-grindavik

  7. Looks like some minor explosive activity is happening. Probably some water magma interaction.

  9. As predicted, the eruption happened when I couldn’t watch …
    This map published 10:30 UTC shows the extension of the fissures:

    The northern fissure runs towards the northern flat slopes of Sundhnukur’s main lava shield “Dalahraun”. The flat landscapes prohibits fast progression of lava flows towards the north. The Catalogue of Icelandic Volcanoes has a map with layers with prehistorical lava flows. The map show that no lava flow from the Sundhnukur fissures ever reached the northern coast road. Many prehistorical lava flows ended somewhere in the lava field desert, and this is probably also the fate of the present eruption.

    • The first fissure yesterday evening was between Stóri-Skógfell and Sundhnúkur as during past events. During the first hours the fissure expanded towards the north until 5-6 o’clock UTC. At the same time eruption activity migrated northeast and decreased on the southern part.
      https://www.vedur.is/um-vi/frettir/jardhraeringar-grindavik

      The development reminds a bit to the recent Mauna Loa eruption: First a curtain of Fire through the central volcano (Sundhnukur and Stori-Skogfell), then after hours a migration to a new eruption site somewhere else.

    • No eruption yet has reached the north coast but eruptions of similar style at Krysuvik have, there is a first for everything. And the two times fissure eruptiobs at Krysuvik did it were the two most recent cycles, so it is relatively new too.

      Its of course unlikely but it would be naive to say it isnt possible. It was considered extremely unlikely for vents to open south of Hagafell but that happened, even within 100 meters of houses.

      All it really takes is some confinement of topography and those huge slow sheets of lava turn into a lava flood you cant outrun. Like it did next to Grindavik back in May, or crossing the road in February. The lava already flowed like 4-5 km unconfined it could easily have gone double that if it stayed narrow.

    • From the IMO map, the lava is approximately 5 km from the airport road. If a future eruption or dyking event pushes further north there could be some squeaky bum moments.

      • I don’t think so. It could be the southern vent of the northern ‘group’.

        • Ah ok.. couldn”t quite get the perspective,, and noticed fountaining within it

    • Looks phreatomagmatic, looks to be a dying phase of the eruption/vent, maybe as the magma “table” gets lower than the water table and begins interacting with it…

  12. The Vogastapi camera at 16:38 pm Iceland time shows lava fountains, but the lava seems cooler than usual, and has black on the outside of the fountain spray edges, when a spurt of lava shoots up in to the air. See https://livefromiceland.is/webcams/vogastapi and zoom in on the magnification factor to see this.

    • I’m quite sure this is an optical phenomenon rather than some geophysical one. At the moment there is so much smoke that the fountains look completely dark:

  13. Everything else seems to be dead already, but there’s very intense fountaining at the northernmost point of the fissures, busily constructing a spatter rampart. It’s only poorly visible in any of the cams I know about. Of those the LFI one (surprisingly, given mbl’s past history) is giving the best view, but from a distance that limits detail and with the shoulder of a hill partly blocking the view.

  14. https://www.youtube.com/live/_Tm34MnVw-g?si=AZVTqv_tYeCKxmSy

    Apparently there was a new fissure that opened up even further north, its not that strong though. I personally never thought it could really erupt this much so far out, theres a tiny lava patch from an od series that is much further north but it is hardly impressive, thjs vent now is the second most northerly vent of Sundhnjukur in the Holocene and looks to mean business. I think the eruption will last at least a week more.

    It also, really,needs to be said that this probably also means Grindavik is very much still in the firing line and possibly so is an eruption on the coastline at the far south end of the dike in the future. That actually would have happened last night if the dikes went south not north. The fissures are getting longer, more powerful, more voluminous and long lived and further apart in time.

    • I was looking at the Litla Skogsfell GPS data last night. It is really too early to read too much into it, but it was looking like there was inflation WSW of Litla Skogsfell, which was further north than the fissure at the time.

    • The eruption weakened fast, as it was probably the case during Medieval and pre-historical eruptions. The lava fields of Eldvörp and Arnaseturshraun cover a limited area. In this area the eruptions are usually too small to reach the ocean or the Airport Road in the north.

      “One episode of eruptive activity (‘Fires’) has occurred in Reykjanes-Svartsengi volcanic systems in historical times, 1210-1240 CE. During these Fires, at least six discrete eruptions occurred at 2 to 12 year intervals.”

      1210-1240 Svartsengi did the a moderate eruption (largest possible size) 1230-1240: “In the Svartsengi volcanic system lavas covering 50 km2 with volume of >0.3 km3 were erupted from fissures between 1230 and 1240 CE”
      https://icelandicvolcanos.is/?volcano=REY#

  15. https://en.vedur.is/media/uncategorized/Gossprungur_23082024_1330.jpeg

    https://en.vedur.is/about-imo/news/volcanic-unrest-grindavik

    View of where the erupting fissures are, and the lava about 14 hours ago from this comment, just afternoon on 23/8 local time.

    Since then the fissure has either extended or a new one has opened a little further north along the trend, and lava has also flowed over that small cliff and probably some distance beyond it too. That cliff is 5.3 km from the road and 6 from Vogar. The slightly brighter patch of ground left of the new lava is old lava from about 2400-3000 years ago, the cycle before the older Sundhnjukur lava (~2000 years old)

    It is unlikely lava will flow all the way to the ocean. But wile the eruption is still strong it cant be ignored, one of the lava flows from Krysuvik 2000 years ago did manage it and the lava flow in question seems to be from the second stage of its eruption, not the curtain of fire, the same stage the eruption now is in where it builds a cone around a few persistent spots. If the activity we see now keeps up for a week then the situation could get scary.

    • The image “https://en.vedur.is/media/uncategorized/Gossprungur_23082024_1330.jpeg” cannot be displayed because it contains errors.

  16. LFI cam 6 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hia5Ejq2778) has a good view of that northern fissure that’s still active … but it keeps pausing and unpausing itself now, which it wasn’t doing a few hours ago. I would appreciate any suggestions on how to get it to stream smoothly. Settings tweaks or whatever.

    • Connection issues, not that weird for livestreams. Its probably on their end maybe because of traffic

  17. I have some questions regarding this current fissure eruption, particularly the northward unzipping of the first fissure lineament and then the second new one, which was accompanied by earthqaukes indicating dike emplacement. It was fascinating to watch this in real time as it occurred.

    In my simplistic view of the start of the eruption, which started at the steaming fumeroles, when the whole fissure lineament was erupting, why didn’t the dike simply open up wider to accomodate the increased pressure? In my thinking, I would have simply had the magma widen the width of the dike, or simply shoot the lava fountains higher due to increased pressure.

    Is there tectonic forces at the top which compress any dike opening, so that it can only get so wide and wider?

    We saw the underground magma breaking rock to the north, obviously indicating incredible pressure. Why didn’t that pressure simply choose to be relieved by higher fountaining in the current fissure lineament? Does the viscosity of the lava suddenly increase as pressure increases?

    The quakes indicated breaking at the depth of 5 km to 2 km. Obviously the magma was breaking in the direction of least resistance. Has some fundamental change on the south side occurred such that the overlying rock is more compressive and thus prohibits any further expansion from the magma underneath? We have watched the south side basically shut down.

    I believe that the northward migration caught everyone by surprise and this eruption series has exhibited new behavior we’ve not seen before and that the dike migration, even after one 4 km segment is fountaining.

    Thank you for considering my questions, I hope that I have been able to adequately describe what’s puzzling me a bit on why the magma went north.

    Randall

    • Not an expert, but I think the northward migration followed the line of the earthquake sequences, albeit possibly in the opposite direction. Suspect the earthquakes to date had made the ground weak enough to unzip.

      • Merlot:
        Wasn’t the earthquakes actually the result of rock spliting from stress? I believe that once rock starts splitting due to a dike intrusion, the weakest part of rock is not due to compressive force but actually due to tensile force perpendicular to the fissure line. Rock is hard to split compressively, but relatively weak to tensile (stretching) forces and so rock will split relatively easy in that direction. The magma exerted a tensile stress, and that in turn lead to the earthquakes we saw.

        • There’s been more than one earthquake sequence in that area since October 23.

    • If you imagine trying to widen a rip in a piece of cloth, it usually lengthens also. It could also be down to alignment of rocks.

  18. It’s very early days but it looks as though deflation at Svartsengi has stopped with a faint suggestion that inflation may resume. Too soon to be definite.

      • The GPS plots are still inconclusive but deflation may be continuing in places.

  19. GB News seem to have put their feet in it. Apparently, on X, they have told British tourists to stay away from Iceland due to volcanic eruptions. https://www.mbl.is/frettir/innlent/2024/08/24/olafur_ragnar_hnytir_i_midil_vegna_hraedsluarodurs/

    Checked with GB News website (don’t use X anymore), some headlines leave a bit to be desired but otherwise they quote the UK Foreign Office.

    The UK Foreign Office (UKFO) advice is common sense: stay away from affected areas; consult with the authorities; and, the rest of Iceland is not impacted (see below). The UKFO would have been liaising with the Icelandic authorities.

    “Recently there has been a series of volcanic eruptions on the Reykjanes peninsula in south-west Iceland, the latest on 22 August. These have affected the town of Grindavik and the area to the north of it. Icelandic authorities advise that you stay away from this area. All roads to Grindavik and the surrounding area are closed.

    It is likely there will be further eruptions in this location. Monitor local media for updates and follow the authorities’ advice on travel to the area. Keflavik International Airport and the road to it is unaffected and operating normally. The capital city, Reykjavik, and the rest of Iceland is not impacted by the eruptions.” Source: https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/iceland/safety-and-security#extreme-weather-and-natural-hazards

  21. From RÚV:

    Lava flow just 5% of that seen at peak (24 Aug)

    A lava pool is forming at the volcanic eruption at Sundhnúksgíga. The main lava flow is to the northwest, but it had not made much progress as of last night. Therefore, it does not look like the lava will reach Grindavíkurvegur [road] any time soon.

    Sigríður Magnea Óskarsdóttir, a natural disaster expert at the Icelandic Meteorological Office, says it looks like a lava lake, or pool, is forming around the fissure.

    A lava lake would be cool! Ok hot actually…you know what I mean. 😀

    • Its not a lava lake in the actual cone but a lava pool near it is what I understand, and what it looks like on videos.

      This actually makes it more likely to have a chance at the road, the lava pond draining is a high flow rate regardless of the vent. I think this is what made the flow that went over the barrier last eruption came from too. I know in Hawaii there were similar lava ponds near Pu’u O’o that would flow very fast up to 5 or 6 km from the vents at times, on similar slope angle to the shield of Thrainsskjaldurhraun that the current eruption is happening on.

      The strength of the fountains still is very notable. Its like at Krafla where early intrusions usually didnt surface or were minor if they did, but later eruptions were very voluminous. The same is true here, the eruptions are getting stronger. November failed completely, December through February were shkrt lived and only the curtain of fire. March onwards has seen progressively more powerful activity following the curtain of fire. If this continues the second stage might well start being a full force eruption in its own right rather than just a holdout of day 1…

      That is where the north road could be in trouble.

  22. Its building up a pretty huge cone now, way bigger than I thought an eruption in this art of Iceland could do. Also the fountains jetting out to the sides 🙂

    I havent seen anything talking about the height of the fountains or cone though, only some rough numbers on the live chats of maybe about 60-100 meters for the fountains, which would make the cone not much less. Considering how visible this is from the most busy road in Iceland it deserves a proper name I think.

    • Yes, it looks like the growth of Paricutin cone (Mexico) in a few days

  24. Looking for Jesper, comments closed there. Dear Jesper I have no time for VC right now. Read your two pieces avout Sao Miguel though. Informative, interesting, complete and above all very beautiful with great pictures as well. Take care.

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