A volcano erupted late on Monday in southwest Iceland, spewing lava and smoke across a wide area after weeks of intense earthquake activity, the country’s Meteorological Office said, threatening a nearby town.
Fearing a significant eruption on the Reykjanes peninsula, authorities last month evacuated the nearly 4,000 inhabitants of the fishing town of Grindavik and closed the nearby Blue Lagoon geothermal spa.
Reykjavik’s nearby Keflavik International Airport remained open, albeit with numerous delays listed for both arrivals and departures.
Local police said they had raised their alert level as a result of the outbreak and the country’s civil defence warned the public not to approach the area while emergency personnel assessed the situation.
Located between the Eurasian and the North American tectonic plates, among the largest on the planet, Iceland is a seismic and volcanic hot spot as the two plates move in opposite directions.
'There She Blows!' Volcano Erupts in Iceland
Hagafell had threatened to erupt since last month and 4k residents of nearby Grindavik were evacuated, on Monday night it blew.
With unexpectedly fast lava flows of 100-200 cubic metres per second flowing from a 3.5km crack in the… pic.twitter.com/7BMhxhDL4W
— RT_India (@RT_India_news) December 19, 2023
But eruptions are still hard to predict. In mid-November, Grindavik inhabitants were whisked from their homes in the middle of the night as the ground shook, roads cracked and buildings suffered structural damage.
