December 2003
(December 2003)
English and American version
The eruption begun on December 7th around 3:30pm in the Dolomieu crater ended the following morning. The bad weather on the massive did not allow any pictures so there is have no record of this short eruption.
In the first hours, the only informations available were the location of the activity: South-Esat of the Dolomieu where the temperature capter stopped emitting 3 minutes before the supposed begining of the eruption(no witness) .
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FLASH ANIMATIONS

During the day of December 8th, the Observatory noticed a light tremor in the summit area that lasted the following days.
On December 9th and 10th, a few visitors (because the access to the volcano was close to the public) noticed during glades a plume of gas in the Dolomieu.
On December 11th, the director of the Observatory of volcanology during a routine work discovered 3 hornitos and some lava flows in the Dolomieu not here the day before. The existing tremor never intensified enough to guess an eruption.
We were there with Alain Gerente in the afternoon of December 12th till december 13th in the morning. During the night a small hornito was born near the 3 others still active. The highest one had an irregular activity, projetions every 5 minutes only.

On December 13th around 6:00am, the small hornito stopped erupting. At 7:10 am the most active Hornito stopped too and 2 minutes later the highest one increased its activity with an important flow of lava at the base.

During the night, we estimated a debit of 3 to 4 cubic meters per second.
The last news from a reporter of the local newspaper J.I.R, Francois Martel, who spent the night of December 13th-14th on the site, indicate that the 4 hornitos are all active again and the debit of lava increases.
At the Observatory, numerous small seisms are recorded for 2 days.

Is it the end ? In fact, several recent eruptions ended after the raise of sismicity during the last days.
The activity of the eruption decrease on Sunday 14th and on Monday 15th, no lava flow could be seen. The seismicity increased on the 14th till its maximun on the 15th, implicating again the official interdiction to access to the volcano (reopened since the 12th).

On Tuesday 16th, we noticed a weakening of the seisms and we can consider this phase of eruption over. However considering the unusual behavior of La Fournaise for several months, we can only wait and see during a few days ...

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