The pillar of smoke and ash was visible from Rome, and some people there claimed they had heard the volcano's rumbling.
Modern scientists estimate the volume of eruptive material at almost four cubic kilometers of magma.
Contrary to earlier assessments, volcanologists today know that there were no lava flows in the 79 AD eruption. The measured volume of the inflated pumice is almost 9 cubic kilometers. Towns were flattened by devastating pyroclastic flows and by the weight of volcanic debris, the countryside was devastated, and thousands were killed, some of them still undiscovered today. Among the dead was the local military commander, Pliny the Elder, the author of the great Natural History, who had been given a sinecure command in the resort town of Pompeii as a reward for his scholarship. His heroic death while trying to mount a rescue of the townspeople is only known from the account of his nephew and pupil, Pliny the Younger, who witnessed the eruption from 30 kilometers away and even at that distance had to flee for his own life.