An earthquake of 4.4 magnitude hit the volcanic area around Naples during the night, causing several injuries of light, damaging buildings and sending residents terrified to the streets, authorities said Thursday.
The earthquake, followed by several much smaller tremors, was the largest to hit the area of the Flegrei Campi (Flegraeanos Campos) in southern Italy for 10 months. It happened around 1:25 am at a depth of 2.5 kilometers, according to the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), and lifted the residents of their beds.
“We cannot continue like this, we cannot sleep. We are scared, “a man told Local equipment News service in the middle of the night in Bagnoli, a coastal district in western Naples.
The images transmitted by Italian media showed masonry broken car windows and damage to a church in Bagnoli, where schools closed on Thursday.
A woman was injured when her roof collapsed, while another two or three people went to the hospital with cuts caused by broken glass fragments, according to the mayor of Naples, Gaetano Manfredi. A total of 11 people went to emergency rooms from local hospitals, but several “panic,” he told reporters.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said she was constantly monitoring the situation and that she was in contact with the relevant officials.
Seismic activity is nothing new in the area, which is an active boiler, left hollow after an eruption, the largest in Europe. It extends from the outskirts of Naples to the sea, measuring about 12 by 15 km.
But many of the 500,000 inhabitants living in the danger zone had already been scared by an earthquake of 4.4 magnitude in May 2024, which was the largest for 40 years. At that time, there were no significant injuries or significant damage.
‘Particularly intense’
The mayor of Naples, Manfredi, said RTL radio Thursday’s earthquake was a “particularly intense tremor”, similar to last year, but “with an epicenter closer to the city of Naples, so he felt more in the city.”
He said that a group of people tried to enter the old base of NATO closed in Bagnoli, presumably for protection.
“There was a moment of panic … but then everything calmed down,” he said, added: “Obviously, these are moments when people are afraid.” Manfredi said the situation was “under control.”
Campi Flegrei’s eruption 40,000 years ago was the most powerful in the Mediterranean.
A resurgence of seismic activity in the early 1980s led to a massive evacuation, which reduced the nearby city of Pozzuoli to a ghost city. The specialists, however, say that a full -fledged eruption in the near future is still unlikely.
