Tags: italy (132 pics) Pantelleria Pantelleria (Sicilian: Pantiddirìa), the ancient Cossyra, is an Italian island in the Strait of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea, 100 km (62 mi) southwest of Sicily and just 70 km (43 mi) east of the Tunisian coast. Administratively Pantelleria is a comune belonging to the Sicilian province of Trapani. Geography The island of Pantelleria is constructed above a drowned continental rift in the Strait of Sicily and has been the locus of intensive volcano-tectonic activity. Two large Pleistocene calderas dominate the island, which contains numerous post-caldera lava domes and cinder cones and is the type locality for peralkaline rhyolitic rocks, pantellerites. The 15-km-long island is the emergent summit of a largely submarine edifice. The 6-km-wide Cinque Denti caldera, the youngest of the two calderas, formed about 45,000 years ago and contains the two post-caldera shield volcanoes of Monte Grande and Monte Gibele. Holocene eruptions have constructed pumice cones, lava domes, and short, blocky lava flows. Many Holocene vents are located on three sides of the uplifted Montagna Grande block on the SE side of the island. A submarine eruption in 1891 (121 years ago) from a vent off the NW coast is the only confirmed historical activity. The island is fertile, but lacks fresh water. The principal town (pop. about 3,000) is on the north-west, upon the only harbour (only fit for small steamers), which is fortified. There was also a penal colony here. The island can be reached by ferries and hydrofoils from Trapani, and lies close to the main route from east to west through the Mediterranean.

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