Maiella National Park

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Parco Nazionale della Maiella
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Majella Massif
Italy provincial location map 2016.svg
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Maiella
Location of the park
Location Abruzzo
Nearest city Sulmona
Coordinates 42°4′55″N14°3′36″E / 42.08194°N 14.06000°E / 42.08194; 14.06000
Area628.38 km2 (242.62 sq mi)
Established1991
Governing bodyMinistero dell'Ambiente
www.parks.it/parco.nazionale.majella/Eindex.html
Palombaro facing the Majella.jpg

Maiella National Park (Italian : Parco Nazionale della Maiella) is a national park located in the provinces of Chieti, Pescara and L'Aquila, in the region of Abruzzo, Italy.

Contents

It is centered on the Maiella massif, of which Monte Amaro is the highest peak, at 2,793 m (9,163 ft) elevation.

The 740.95 km2 (286.08 sq mi) large area of Maiella National Park, especially the Montagna della Majella, has been subject to a major international geoscientific research project, TaskForceMajella, from 1998 up to 2005. Along the northern slope of the mountain for thousands of years hydrocarbon extraction has occurred from spontaneous seepages and shallow wells. [1] On April 21, 2021, Maiella National Park was declared a UNESCO Global Geopark under the name of Majella Geopark. [2] [3] [4]

Main sights

The park contains about 500 kilometers of hiking trails through the mountains, cave paintings in Grotta Sant'Angelo and Grotta del Cavallone (the latter being one of the deepest caves in Europe open to the public).

Tourist centers located in the park include:

Wildlife

Marsican brown bear Orso bruno marsicano.jpg
Marsican brown bear
Italian wolves La bellezza dei lupi Parco Nazionale d'Abruzzo l'Aquila Italy 11.png
Italian wolves

Due to its altitude, inaccessibility and prominence most of the park's territories are uninhabited and so the human-made structures, including skiing resorts and roads, are fewer than those in other national parks of Italy. This condition favored the Apennine wildlife which is shown here in all its greatness. The most representative animal of the Majella territories is the Italian wolf which is also present in the park's logo and it relies on a population of 100 estimated wolves distributed in eleven packs across the main mountain ranges of the protected area. GPS-collars are applied to 17 wolves for ongoing monitoring. It is believed that the wolf population density of the Majella national park is one of the highest in Italy and in the world even if compared to Yellowstone national park.

Notable also the presence of species of the following animals:

The amphibians and reptiles that live in this mountainous landscape are the spectacled salamander, the yellow-billed toad and the unique Orsini's viper.

Also goshawk, buzzard, rock partridge, alpine and red-billed chough, peregrine falcon and sparrow hawk are some important bird species that breed inside the park.

Finally other mammals that thrive in the dense forests that surround the majella massif are the wild boar, the Corsican hare, the European pine marten, the European wildcat, the red fox, the European badger and the rare European otter.

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Abruzzo, historically known as Abruzzi, is a region of Southern Italy with an area of 10,763 square km and a population of 1.3 million. It is divided into four provinces: L'Aquila, Teramo, Pescara, and Chieti. Its western border lies 80 km (50 mi) east of Rome. Abruzzo borders the region of Marche to the north, Lazio to the west and north-west, Molise to the south and the Adriatic Sea to the east. Geographically, Abruzzo is divided into a mountainous area in the west, which includes the highest massifs of the Apennines, such as the Gran Sasso d'Italia and the Maiella, and a coastal area in the east with beaches on the Adriatic Sea.

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Lama dei Peligni is a comune and town in the province of Chieti in the Abruzzo region of Italy with 1,155 inhabitants. It is also part of the Aventino-Medio Sangro mountain community and the municipal territory is included in the Maiella National Park. The town, known to naturalists as the country of chamois, is located in a florofaunal area of particular interest.

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The Giardino Botanico Daniela Brescia is a botanical garden located in the Majella National Park at an altitude of 900 meters above sea level, in Sant'Eufemia a Maiella, Abruzzo, Italy. It is open daily during the summer, and weekends otherwise.

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TaskForceMajella (TFM) is an industry-funded geoscientific research project conducted between the years 1998 and 2005. The project involved numerous universities distributed worldwide, and was sponsored by a number of international major oil companies. The area of research was the Majella Mountain in Central Italy, regarded as an analogue of a faulted and fractured hydrocarbon reservoir as can be found in major provinces like the Middle East, Caspian Basin, Mediterranean Basin, and other areas. The scope was to obtain knowledge on the relation between fracture and fault generation, and all types of geological aspects of the evolution of the geological structure.

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Tourism in Abruzzo has become one of the most prosperous sectors in the economy of Abruzzo, and in recent years has seen a remarkable growth attracting numerous tourists from Italy and Europe. According to statistics, in 2021 arrivals totaled 1,330,887. A total of 5,197,765 arrivals were tourists, a figure that puts the region seventeenth among the Italian regions for numbers of tourists per year. A moderate support to tourism is also given to the Abruzzo Airport with many low cost and charter flights connecting the entire region with the rest of Europe.

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The 1706 Abruzzo earthquake, also known as the Maiella earthquake, occurred on November 3 at 13:00 CEST. The earthquake with a possible epicenter in the Central Apennine Mountains (Maiella), Abruzzo had an estimated moment magnitude of 6.6–6.84 Mw . It was assigned a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme), causing tremendous destruction in Valle Peligna. At least 2,400 people were killed.

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References

  1. van Dijk, J.P. (2019); The 7000 Years Long Journey of the Majella Oil Men - The Fascinating Story of Central Italian Hydrocarbon Exploitation and Earth Sciences in the Val Pescara and the Montagna della Majella. 282 pp. ISBN   978-1077215139 ASIN   1077215134 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/334290729_The_7000_Years_Long_Journey_of_the_Majella_Oil_Men_-_The_Fascinating_Story_of_Central_Italian_Hydrocarbon_Exploitation_and_Earth_Sciences_in_the_Val_Pescara_and_the_Montagna_della_Majella
  2. "Nasce il Majella Geopark, Geoparco Mondiale dell'UNESCO" (in Italian). April 21, 2021.
  3. "Majella Geopark" (in Italian). Retrieved May 7, 2021.
  4. "Un cammino lungo cinque anni, nasce il 'Majella Geopark'" (in Italian). Sulmona: ANSA. May 3, 2021.