Etna North – Randazzo
Coordinates: 33S 499620E 4181825N (Utm Wgs84) | 37°47'01.7″N 14°59'44.5″E
ELEVATION: 2515 m
Development: Approximately 200 m in total.
Nearest known location: Mt Grigio – Pious Friars
Exploration: Easily explored with just a helmet and lights.
Taken over by Dario and Paolo Teri with Augusto Nicolosi, Sebastiano Mirici (on 29.10.2020)
Notified to the relevant municipality on nd

DESCRIPTION: This cave is located near the 1981 eruptive fracture, at the same altitude as the famous Pious Brothers. Difficult to locate as there are no nearby paths, you need to reach it via the coordinates. After the survey, a cairn was placed outside. In the winter months the entrance can often be blocked by snow, hiding the entrance. At the time of the survey, there were no typical cairns or other signs of human passage, leading to the hypothesis that it could be an unpublished or very little known cave on recent lavas, presumably from 1975/6 or 1981 or from the superposition of these lavas. The uncertainty is due to the fact that the cave is located right on the edge and downstream of the 81 fracture. The cave is a typical lava flow hypogeum whose access is from its most downstream part. At the entrance you descend into a first larger room from which you need to descend to a further lower level to then begin to travel along the actual lava flow channel. After about 40 meters the cave forks into two branches, the one on the right narrower, but still passable on all fours. The main branch follows the slope of the terrain steadily until reaching, after about 100 meters, a narrow passage due to a collapse of the vault that exposed more incoherent and apparently more unstable material. For this safety reason it was preferred not to continue exploring the cavity further. Some "Speleo themes" are of considerable interest, including hundreds of lava pendants (improperly called remelting stalactites), some 10/12 cm long, among the longest ever noted on Etna, then flow streaks and even blisters. Other caves of modest size have been found nearby, not worthy of mention. The name of this cave refers to the surname of the surveyors, passionate and tenacious explorers of the Etna volcanic territory.