Piton Sainte-Rose is a village located on the eastern coast of the Réunion

Réunion

Réunion is a French island with a population of about 800,000 located in the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar, about south west of Mauritius, the nearest island.Administratively, Réunion is one of the overseas departments of France...

 island (a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 department) in the Indian Ocean

Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering approximately 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by the Indian Subcontinent and Arabian Peninsula ; on the west by eastern Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and...

. It is part of the commune of Sainte-Rose.

History

In April 1977, Piton Sainte-Rose is devastated by a lava flow from the Piton de la Fournaise

Piton de la Fournaise

Piton de la Fournaise : "Peak of the Furnace" is a shield volcano on the eastern side of Réunion island in the Indian Ocean. It is currently one of the most active volcanoes in the world, along with Kīlauea in the Hawaiian Islands , Stromboli, Etna and Mount Erebus in Antarctica...

, the active volcano of the island. The village church was partly invaded by the lava flow but not destroyed. The church was subsequently restored and renamed « Notre Dame des Laves » (Our Lady of the Lava).