Mount Etna, Europe’s largest and most active volcano, has been grouchy in recent weeks, sending up plumes of glowing red lava and ash that could be seen for miles from its peaks in Sicily.

And early on Thursday, it issued another fearsome blast, injuring at least 10 people who had been on the mountain to take a closer look, according to wire service reports.

A BBC science reporter on the scene described what happened in a series of tweets.

“Many injured — some head injuries, burns, cuts and bruises,” the BBC reporter, Rebecca Morrelle, wrote in describing a dramatic flight down the mountain amid a “huge explosion.”

“Running down a mountain pelted by rocks, dodging burning boulders and boiling steam — not an experience I ever want to repeat,” Ms. Morrelle wrote.

An unnamed volcanologist on the mountain, she said, told her it was the “most dangerous incident experience in his 30-year career.”

Ms. Morrelle said a medical team had logged at least eight injuries, all minor, and that the BBC crew was unharmed. Emergency authorities reported other injuries later.

Back at the hotel, Ms. Morrelle shared a photograph of Rachel Price, a camera operator, brandishing a coat with a big hole burned through by “a lump of rock.”

This prompted a reply from Philippa Demonte, a volcanologist apparently sitting safely in Salford, England, who recalled her early days studying lava flows in Hawaii.

“Rule No. 1 — no synthetic clothing,” she wrote.

Images of the eruption were also captured from space. In this satellite image, posted by the European Space Agency, the snow has been processed in blue, to distinguish it from clouds.(NYT)