Campi Flegrei, new tremors in the night, a commissioner arrives

Another night on the road for the inhabitants of the Campi Flegrei: earthquakes with a magnitude between 2.3 and 3.5 were recorded. The seismographs of the Ingv, the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology, recorded them between 3.28 and 4.17 am. The strongest tremor of the latest seismic swarm was magnitude 4.4, recorded in the evening of 20 May.

Meanwhile, over the past three weeks, Fire Department personnel have carried out more than a thousand stability checks on buildings in the Phlegraean area: 405 carried out by rescue teams and 596 completed by officials experienced in assessing static instabilities. The greatest structural criticalities were found in some buildings in Pozzuoli. 76 evacuation orders were issued.

Minister Nello Musumeci announced an ad hoc decree for the Phlegraean area in the aftermath of the magnitude 4.4 tremor on 20 May, which is now in the final stages. Also certain is the appointment of an extraordinary commissioner for the Phlegraean Fields who will have the task of coordinating the interventions contained in the new decree. On 21 June, a exercise of Scenario 3 of decree 140 is scheduled to occupy the whole day. There are strong protests from the owners of the evacuated houses, who are obliged by an order of the mayor to secure the evicted buildings at their own expense. There are loud calls in the area to declare a state of emergency.

May 2024 is the month in which the highest number of earthquake tremors have been recorded in the Phlegraean Fields since the current bradyseismic phase began in 2005 and also in the last 40 years. In May, 1,525 earthquakes were recorded, of which 495 occurred during eleven seismic swarms. The magnitude 4.4 earthquake that occurred at 20.10 on 20 May was the highest-energy event recorded in the last 40 years. The data are shown in the monthly monitoring bulletin of the Phlegraean Fields published by the Vesuvius Observatory, the Ingv's Neapolitan branch.

A total of eight earthquakes of magnitude between 3.0 and 4.0 were recorded in May, while there were 20 tremors of magnitude between 2.0 and 3.0. On the basis of the picture of volcanic activity outlined in the bulletin, the Vesuvius Observatory emphasises that "there are no elements to suggest significant evolutions in the short term". The monitoring of the Phlegraean area remains at yellow alert level.