A volcano has erupted in Iceland for the second time in four weeks. In the fifth eruption in the southwest of the North Atlantic island since 2021, the lava bubbling out of the earth reached the evacuated coastal town of Grindavík for the first time, where it set several houses on fire. This was shown by aerial photos from the Icelandic radio station RÚV.
The place was able to be evacuated in time
The town of 4,000 residents had already been evacuated on Sunday night when another series of earthquakes was announced on the Reykjanes Peninsula southwest of Reykjavik. The eruption finally began at 7:57 a.m. (local time) in the morning, when the first lava bubbled out of an elongated fissure in the earth a few hundred meters north of Grindavík.
Just a few hours later, a veritable sea of lava had formed in the area, glowing glowing red in the dawn. After a helicopter flyover at RÚV in the morning, volcano expert Magnús Tumi Guðmundsson estimated that the crack in the earth had grown to a length of a good kilometer.
This lava was already threateningly close to Grindavík. “Lava is now flowing towards the city,” warned the Icelandic weather authority Vedurstofa. The authorities called on people not to think about hiking to the lava. At the edge of the glowing lava, work machines that had been used to build systems to protect the coastal town from the lava were removed.
Then the earth opened in another place in the midday hours – directly on the northern outskirts of Grindavík. From there, the glowing red lava moved down the valley before it caught at least two houses, which then burst into flames. Since the place had been evacuated, there was no danger to human life – but there was a danger to the belongings of the affected residents.
Workers literally swallowed by the earth
Grindavík is located around 40 kilometers southwest of Reykjavik. The place had already been affected by the last eruption in mid-December – although not by the lava, but by a number of earthquakes that heralded the eruption. The quakes caused deep cracks in roads and other damage. A few days ago, according to Icelandic media reports, a worker allegedly fell into one of these crevices – the search for him has now been stopped without him being found.
This time too, the weather authority recorded an intense series of earthquakes with more than 200 tremors before the eruption. The agency warned that magma was moving beneath the Earth’s surface and the likelihood of an eruption was high.
The last time an eruption occurred in the area was in the late evening of December 18th, when lava initially bubbled out of a fissure in the earth several kilometers long. However, the eruption significantly decreased in intensity within a few days. Before Christmas, liquid lava was no longer visible on the earth’s surface. The residents of Grindavík were ultimately able to spend the holidays in their own four walls – but with the constant uncertainty that the earth beneath them had not come to rest.
