During an eruption, a volcano spewed molten lava.

On 24 August 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted, destroying the Roman city of Pompeii, (TV: The Fires of Pompeii) and burying the nearby town of Herculaneum in ash. (PROSE: A History of Humankind) Two incarnations of the Doctor, the seventh (AUDIO: The Fires of Vulcan) and the tenth, (TV: The Fires of Pompeii) were present in Pompeii during the eruption, although they avoided meeting.

Eruption of Souffrier was a painting by J. M. W. Turner, which depicted a volcano erupting in sultry ambers and vivid scarlets. (PROSE: The Mark of the Rani) Other paintings by Turner, such as one the Eighth Doctor recalled in 1816, depicted the drastically-changed skies resulting from the huge amount of ash released by the eruption of Tambora the previous year. (AUDIO: Mary's Story)

A volcanic eruption occured at Krakatoa in 1883. (TV: Inferno)

A hypervolcano on Goethe once erupted, covering the planet's only continent in molten debris. (PROSE: The Bunny's Curse)