Travel Guide Volcan Erta Alé

Erta Ale means "smoking mountain" in the Afar language. Until 2017, this active volcano was one of the most impressive in the world, as it is a "shield volcano", or effusive volcano, with a large volcanic crater filled with a lake of fluid, red lava, rumbling and moving, obviously very spectacular. You see pictures of it on every Ethiopian expedition brochure. But in early 2017, the volcano's caldera collapsed, smothering the lava field, and it "went to sleep". In May 2019, a new fault opened up 12 km from the volcanic cone, now spilling lava fields into the desert. Agencies currently offer the Erta Ale volcano excursion from Semera. The extreme conditions of the expedition, the now very long distances by 4 x 4 and the heat are so demanding that they have to be taken into account.The story of one hundred and twenty years of a fascinating volcano. Erta Ale may not be very high (613 m above sea level), but it is vast: it extends over a diameter of almost 30 km and is part of the Afar Depression, which stretches for around 100 km and includes other volcanic cones (Gada Ale, Alu-Daa Filla, Borare Ale, Hayli Gub and Ale Bagu). The first explorers to climb it were the great Haroun Tazieff and his teammate Giorgio Marinelli in 1968, but no serious observations were made until the end of the war with Eritrea in 2001. The lava lake, which had existed since the early 1900s, lasted one hundred and seventeen years before collapsing, and measured around 80 by 100 m. Located at a depth of almost 80 m, it emitted fountains of lava up to 10 m high. Activity was highly variable from one hour to the next, and a phase of lava jets could precede a calmer phase of quiet bubbling in the "sea of lava". There have been three major eruptions: in 2005, the first killed nearly 250 Afar nomads living at the foot of the crater, then in 2007 and 2008, its activity forced the evacuation of hundreds of nomads without causing any casualties. In early 2017, the caldera collapsed during a rear eruption. In May 2019, an explosion occurred north of the Afdera volcano and south of the Erta Ale chain of volcanic cones, causing a fissure.