Volcano monitoring at Mount Etna using fiber optic cables

In order to understand and predict volcanic events even better, a better understanding of the diverse underground processes involved is required. A new way to detect such processes, even if they are very subtle, is to use fiber optic cables as sensors. The analysis of light that is backscattered in them when the cables are deformed by vibrations, for example, has now made it possible for the first time to determine the volcanic signature of the Sicilian volcano Etna very precisely.