A thick river of lava is threatening a tourist refuge on the southern slopes of Mount Etna after up to five earthquakes rocked the region yesterday, prompting residents to flee their homes.

"It was like reliving a nightmare, the walls shook for what appeared to be an endless time," Enrico Pappalardo, mayor of the nearby town of Santa Venerina, told the Italian news agency ANSA.

No one was injured and no buildings were damaged in the quakes that measured between 2.5 and 3.7 on the Richter scale.

The tourist facilities on the volcano's south east flank have already been evacuated and local relief workers have been using bulldozers to build a 15-metre high wall of earth in an effort to protect the refuge.

Some ski-lifts above the refuge have already been engulfed by the lava, flowing some 600 metres away.

Etna, Europe's most active volcano, began its most recent eruptions at the end of last month, spewing rivers of lava and belching out columns of thick ash and smoke that closed the nearby Catania airport for days.

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