Who is Mount Vesuvius?

Mount Vesuvius is a big, sleepy mountain that sometimes wakes up and throws rocks into the sky.

Imagine you have a jar full of tiny stones and hot lava, that's like what’s inside Mount Vesuvius. When it wakes up, it burps really hard, sending out hot rock, ash, and lava all around it. This is called an eruption.

A long time ago, in the year 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius had a very big wake-up call. It sent out so much hot stuff that it covered two cities, Pompeii and Herculaneum, like a blanket made of ash and lava. People were caught off guard, and many couldn’t escape.

It's kind of like when you’re eating your favorite cookie, and suddenly the kitchen is filled with smoke from a burnt toaster, except this was much bigger and happened to real people!