August 24th: The Day Mount Vesuvius Erupted

Pompeii remains

On August 24th 79 AD, one of the most famous and catastrophic eruptions occurred from the great Mount Vesuvius, destroying the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum with pyroclastic flows. Approximately 16,000 people died from this eruption, and the blast was said to have released 100,000 times more thermal energy than the Hiroshima bombing of 1945.
   Seventeen years prior to the eruption, a large earthquake caused colossal damage to the Bay of Naples and especially the town of Pompeii. This led the area to grow accustomed to minor tremors in the earth, which according to Pliny the Younger (the witness of the 79 AD Vesuvius eruption), grew more and more frequent, and small earthquakes repeatedly occurred in the 4 days before the eruption on August 24th.
   By 2003, 1,044 casts of the victims killed by the eruption were recovered, and the impressions of their bodies in the ash deposits have been found in and around Pompeii. Tourists can visit the town of Pompeii and view the remains of victims frozen in the position they were in during the last few seconds of life. Have you visited Mount Vesuvius or Pompeii?