An unprecedented fourth major eruption this year has seen the French island of Reunion once again make headlines as more visitors, in particular volcano spotters, head there. More recently, the island made headlines when debris from missing flight MH 370 washed up on Reunion Island’s eastern beaches.
The Piton de la Fournaise once more erupted, and the local administration immediately decreed a full range of safety measures for the local population after already giving advance warning of an imminent eruption on August 19.
The rugged interior of the island, including trails up to the crater of the volcano, have in recent years attracted a new breed of adventure tourists seeking to hike and bike across the hundreds of kilometers of well-marked trails in a zone declared a UNESCO World Heritage site some years ago. In 2015, eruption chasers joined the growing number of visitors heading to this French island deep in the Indian Ocean.
Helicopter flights, while presently not permitted to over-fly the eruption zone, still permit tourists to see the lava flows from a safe distance and are hugely popular with visitors.
