A volcano in Iceland has erupted for the seventh time this year, spraying molten lava and forcing locals to evacuate.
Homes and businesses in the town of Grindavik were evacuated on Thursday morning due to the eruption on the nearby Reykjanes Peninsula.
The eruption in southwestern Iceland started with little warning at 11:14 pm on Wednesday night, with residents given just 45 minutes warning.
It is the seventh time the volcano has erupted since December 2023, and the tenth in three years. While the eruption poses no threat to air travel, authorities have warned of harmful gas emissions across large parts of the peninsula.
The repeated eruptions in Grindavik, which is around 30 miles southwest of capital Reykyavik, has damaged property and infastructure in the area and forced some of the town’s 3,800 inhabitants to relocate.
In a Facebook post, Iceland’s meteorological office said the crack remained ‘the most active around its centre’ while lava was spewing west and north of the volcano.
The western lava flow, moving at 300 metres per hour, had crossed the Grindavík road and approached the Njarðvíkuræð pipeline which services the area with hot water.
A fibre optic cable connecting Grindavík was severed due to the volcanic eruption, but the pipleline is expected to hold, according to Hjördís Guðmundsdóttir, spokesperson for Civil Protection.
‘This possibility was anticipated, and traffic through the fibre optic cable has already been rerouted,’ Hjördís told state broadcaster RUV.
Key infrastructure in the region is not thought to be at risk though, she added.
Authorities had previously warned of volcanic activity in the Reykjanes Peninsula, which experienced its lasy eruption as recently as September 6.
‘In the big picture, this is a bit smaller than the last eruption and the eruption that occurred in May,’ said Magnús Tumi Guðmundsson, a professor of geophysics who flew over the eruption with the Civil Protection agency to monitor it.
‘Grindavík is not in danger as it looks and it is unlikely that this crack will get any longer, although nothing can be ruled out,’ he added.
Iceland sits above a volcanic hotspot in the North Atlantic, and averages one eruption every four to five years.
Ten eruptions have occured since the start of the current wave of volcanic activity in the peninsula, which began in March 2021.
The longest eruption occurred at Fagradalsfjall (March–September 2021), which lasted 183 days.
Eruptions near Sundhnúksgígar have generally been shorter, with the longest lasting 53 days in spring 2024.
The Fagradalsfjall eruption produced the most lava, totalling 150 million cubic metres in total, but its average daily output was much smaller at 820,000 cubic metres.
In contrast, a one-day eruption at Sundhnúksgígar in February 2024 produced 12.8 million cubic metres of lava, over 15 times more per day than Fagradalsfjall.
The most disruptive volcano in recent times came from the 2010 eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull, which spewed clouds of volcanic ash into the air which disrupted trans-Atlantic air travel for months.
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