A renowned Greek seismologist is under investigation after an April Fool’s Day announcement that a massive funnel could open up beneath the volcanic island of Santorini, a popular tourist destination.
Akis Tselentis, director of Greece’s Institute of Geodynamics and Tsunami, posted a photo on Facebook on Wednesday of himself posing as a fake culprit, holding up a sign on which he wrote: “Guilty of April Fool’s Day prank.”
“We live in a country where humor is persecuted, while child molesters, rapists and con artists are not,” he added.
A preliminary investigation for spreading false information
On Tuesday, a prosecutor ordered a preliminary investigation to determine whether Akis Tselentis’ April 1 post qualified as spreading fake news.
“Things are not going well in Santorini,” Akis Tselentis said on Facebook. “Since January we have been witnessing the gradual disappearance of the magma under the volcano.”
Akis Tselentis claimed in his joke that there was a “great possibility” that the magma would move towards a fictional volcano, creating a funnel-shaped void that could “absorb the waters of the Aegean Sea”.
Santorini was completely reshaped by a volcanic eruption at the end of the 17th century BC. C., which ended the Minoan civilization. Its geothermal activity, accompanied by seismic tremors, remains high to this day. The last major eruption from the most active part of the volcano, below the uninhabited lava islet of Kameni, near Santorini, occurred in 1950.
Source: BFM TV
