Image of Cumbre Vieja volcano opts for NASA's best terrestrial photo

Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Spain), 24 Mar An image of the volcano eruption at Cumbre Vieja, on the Spanish island of La Palma, has chances of becoming the best terrestrial photo of the year in the competition organized by NASA. At the moment, this snapshot, taken on October 4 by astronaut Joshua Stevens on board the international space station, showing an intense column of black smoke rising several hundred meters, making its way between two banks of clouds, is among the top four. As if it were a qualifying championship, it went through several phases in which it has been measured with two photos of Southern California under a blanket of clouds, of the plume of smoke and ash on Mount Etna, and of the eruption of a volcano on the Reykjanes peninsula, in Iceland. Thus, the image of Cumbre Vieja is the best of the eruptions that have gone into competition. Now in the semifinals, the four elements are represented: earth, by an image of the Kalahari desert; air, by a formation of clouds over Sumatra; fire, by the volcano of La Palma; and water, by an image of the formation of ice on water in the Antarctic continent. NASA points out on its website that since 1999 the Earth Observatory has been publishing hundreds of images of this “incredible” and “ever-changing” planet and invites you to participate in this year's contest. The voting period will remain open from March 1 to April 5. The Canary Islands have already “won” this photo contest twice: in 2013 for an image of the Tagoro underwater volcano, in El Hierro, and in 2014 for one of the archipelago in which the islands appear to sail over the ocean by the action of the trade winds on the sea. CHIEF jmor/icn