Following the technical activities of yesterday's meeting chaired by the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) and the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the United States Ambassador John R. Phillips this morning went to the Vesuvius Observatory (OV), Naples section of the INGV to visit the volcanic area with the related monitoring and surveillance structures. He was welcomed by the Director of the OV-INGV, Giuseppe De Natale, together with a delegation from the Municipality of Naples and the Municipality of Pozzuoli, with the Mayor Vincenzo Figliolia. Established in 1841 by the will of Ferdinand II of Bourbon Two Sicilies, the Vesuvian Observatory is one of the most advanced volcanic monitoring centers in the world, with its Control Room which receives data from hundreds of seismic, deformation, marine, geodetic and meteorological monitoring stations installed on the three Neapolitan volcanic areas: Vesuvius, Campi Flegrei and Ischia. The Control Room is manned 24 hours a day, equipped with systems for the automatic localization of earthquakes that occur in the three areas and connected with the National Civil Protection Department, to which information on each volcanic event is sent in real time . The Vesuvian Observatory has recently equipped itself with technologically advanced networks for monitoring highly sensitive wells and for monitoring volcanic phenomena at sea.
The visit continued to the Solfatara crater, generated by an eruption about 4000 years ago and still today characterized by spectacular fumarolic emissions, whose temperature reaches about 160°C. The area between the Solfatara and the Terme di Agnano is also where most of the earthquakes are located which, since 1970, have occasionally affected the volcanic area of Campi Flegrei. After the Solfatara, it was the turn of the Serapeum, the ancient Temple of Serapis housed in the Roman 'Macellum' (Market), with the characteristic marble columns that bear evident signs of corrosion caused by marine molluscs, evidence of the phenomenon called ' bradyseism' which in the last two thousand years has caused maximum variations in the ground level of about 20 metres. From 1969 to 1984, one of the most intense and persistent uplift episodes observed in a volcanic area caused about 3.5 meters of soil uplift in this point.
From the Serapeum, the Ambassador went to Vesuvius. Here, at about 650 meters above sea level, the Ambassador visited the historic site, the 'Royal Vesuvius Observatory', i.e. the neoclassical building built to house the oldest volcanological observatory in the world, founded in 1841 and inaugurated in 1845. The Reale Osservatorio Vesuviano, which represents the History of Volcanology, has had illustrious Directors over time, including Macedonio Melloni, one of the most important physicists of all time, discoverer of infrared radiation: Giuseppe Mercalli, distinguished volcanologist and seismologist, inventor of the intensity scale of earthquakes that still bears his name today; Luigi Palmieri, inventor of the first electromagnetic seismograph (1857). Today the 'Royal Vesuvius Observatory', subject to intense restoration work, has recently reopened to the public as a museum of science and volcanology, and as an important scientific dissemination facility in the area. To welcome the Mayor of Ercolano, Ciro Bonajuto, and the Senator of the Italian Republic Vincenzo Cuomo.
The day ended at the archaeological site of Oplontis, buried like Herculaneum and Pompeii by the eruption of 79 AD. The Oplontis area has three of the most fascinating Roman villas in the whole area: the Villa of Poppea, the Villa Rustica of Lucio Crasso III and the Villa of Caio Siculi.