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Archive for the ‘iceland volcanoes’ Category

Irish Sea earthquakes send tremors across British Isles

Posted by feww on August 26, 2013

Earthquakes felt both in Ireland and the UK

Two earthquakes struck in the Irish Sea early Sunday, said the British Geological Survey.

The strongest shock measured 3.3 on the Richter scale at a depth of about 5km some 25km off the coast of Blackpool at 10.58am (BST), and was reportedly felt by people on the British mainland.

An earlier quake measuring about 2.4 magnitude at a depth of 3km occurred about 4 hours earlier.

[Really?]

“The Irish National Seismic Network , which monitors seismic activity, has said that today’s earthquakes were ‘most likely the result of glacial rebound, the process whereby stresses built up the weight of glaciers from the last Ice Age are slowly released,'” said a report.

“It was not as strong as the Irish Sea earthquake on May 29th this year. The epicenter of the quake, which registered at magnitude 3.8, was 15km away from the town of Abersoch in Gwynedd, the British Geological Survey (BGS) said.”

A magnitude 4.0 quake struck the Iceland Region (62.90°N, 25.18°W) on Sunday at 07:00 UTC.

Local geologists would be advised to investigate connection between those quakes.

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Katla’s ice cap is melting

Posted by feww on July 9, 2011

Melting of Katla’s ice cap is causing flooding near the volcano: Iceland Civil Protection Agency

Flooding may have been caused either by a small eruption, or geothermal heat emitted from the volcano, the authorities said.

Katla is one of Iceland’s largest and most active volcanoes. Located east of the Eyjafjallajökull glacier, near the southern end of Iceland’s eastern volcanic zone, Katla is buried beneath the Myrdalsjökull icecap. Its peak reaches 1,512 meters.

Map of Iceland’s Recent Earthquakes


Source: Icelandic Met Office. Image may be subject to copyright.


Katla’s last significant eruption occurred in 1928. The volcano is credited with sixteen major eruptions between 930 and 1918 occurring at intervals of 40–80 years.


Katla volcano, located near the southern end of Iceland’s eastern volcanic zone, is mostly hidden beneath the Myrdalsjökull icecap, which extends across the top of the photo. Valley glaciers descend from the summit icecap toward the coastal plain in this aerial view from the SSW. Explosive eruptions from Katla, among the largest tephra-producers in Iceland during historical time, have frequently been accompanied by damaging jökulhlaups, or glacier-outburst floods. Photo by Oddur Sigurdsson, 1985 (Icelandic National Energy Authority). Caption by GVP.

Iceland Volcanoes – Activity Forecast

FIRE-EARTH will await further development before updating the following forecast, if needed.

FIRE-EARTH Forecast: Iceland Volcanic Activity

Probability of Volcanic Activity in Iceland

Simulations of FIRE-EARTH Geophysical Model (EarthModel) show that a major volcanic eruption may occur in Iceland by October 2011 with a certainty of 0.7 [P= 72%]

Iceland’s Volcanic Eruptions since 1902

  • 2011 Grímsvötn
  • 2010 Eyjafjallajökull
  • 2004 Grímsvötn
  • 2000 Hekla
  • 1998 Grímsvötn
  • 1996 Gjálp
  • 1991 Hekla
  • 1984 Krafla
  • 1983 Grímsvötn
  • 1981 Krafla 2 eruptions
  • 1981 Hekla
  • 1980 Hekla
  • 1980 Krafla 3 eruptions
  • 1977 Krafla 2 eruptions
  • 1975 Krafla
  • 1973 subaquatic eruption 5 km south of Landeyjar coast
  • 1973 Heimaey
  • 1970 Hekla
  • 1963-1967 Surtsey
  • 1961 Askja
  • 1947 Hekla
  • 1938 Grímsvötn
  • 1934 Grímsvötn
  • 1933 Grímsvötn
  • 1929 Askja
  • 1927 Askja
  • 1926 northeast of Eldey
  • 1924 Askja
  • 1923 Askja
  • 1922 Askja 2 eruptions
  • 1922 Grímsvötn
  • 1921 Askja
  • 1918 Katla
  • 1913 Austan Heklu
  • 1910 Þórðarhyrna
  • 1903 Þórðarhyrna
  • 1902 Grímsvötn

List of Iceland’s volcanic eruptions since 1902 sourced from Icelandic Met Office Website.

Recent Volcanic Activity [Source: GVP]

29 June-5 July 2011

New Activity/Unrest: 

Ongoing Activity:

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Eyjafjallajökull Volcano: Unending Eruption

Posted by feww on May 13, 2010

Eyjafjallajökull Following Chaitén Scenario?

Chaitén Erupted for Many Months, Stopped, and Erupted Again

Eyjafjallajökull eruption continues unabated, Icelandic Met Office (IMO) said. The ash plume reduced slightly and changed direction heading ESE.

The ash cloud has wreaked havoc in parts of southern Europe, disrupting flights in as far south as Portugal, Spain and Morocco in recent days, according to media reports.


Reaching a height of four to 5 kilometers (13,000-17,000 feet), the plume of ash from Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano rises above a sea of clouds in this image. MODIS on  NASA’s Aqua satellite captured the image on May 12, 2010. Source: NASA E/O [Caption edited for brevity.] Download large image (1003 KB, JPEG). Click image to enlarge.


The above photo was taken by Ólafur Sigurjónsson on May 7 at 21:00 local time. Image published by IMO. Read full story here. Click image to enlarge.

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Posted in environment, iceland volcanoes, Icelandic ash cloud, volcanic ash, volcanic hazard | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

Eyjafjallajökull Eruption – Latest Satellite Image

Posted by feww on May 11, 2010

Eyjafjallajökull Eruption Continues Unabated

Europe Should Fear the Worst From Icelandic Volcanoes, and Start Large-Scale Contingency Planning: Fire-Earth*

Fire Earth believes there’s more than 80 percent probability of a second, larger Icelandic volcano erupting this year.

About 50 additional volcanic tremors have struck beneath Eyjafjallajökull Glacier volcano in the past 12 hours, IMO automatic chart shows.

Farms  south of the eruption site have experienced almost continuous tephra fall over the last 24 hours, Iceland Met Office (IMO) reported.


The plume rising from the Eyjafjallajökull volcano reached up to 6kms (20,000 feet) a.s.l. on May 10, 2010, as MODIS on NASA’s Aqua satellite captured this image. The ash is blowing southeast over the North Atlantic Ocean. Red outlines the location of a hot spot (probably lava) on the summit of the volcano. Farms south of the erupting volcano reported that course ash fell throughout the day. The icecap east of the volcano—Myrdals-jökull—is painted with two black stripes that reveal where the wind blew concentrated plumes of ash in previous days. Image and Caption: NASA E/O. [Caption edited for brevity.]

Volcanic Ash Advisory from London – Issued graphics


Flight Cancellation/ Airport Closures

  • More than a dozen European airports in southern Europe and N Africa were closed.
  • Parts of Turkish airspace were restricted

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*We know that you can’t and won’t prepare for the looming disasters, but we are morally obligated to warn you! Fire-Earth

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Eyjafjallajökull Glacier Hit by New Wave of Seismicity

Posted by feww on May 10, 2010

About 3 dozen quakes strike Eyjafjallajökull Glacier, other quake clusters near Kolbeinsey ridge and Tjörnes fracture zone

Recent IMO Assessment – dated 09 May 2010 at 15:00UTC

The plume mostly reached height of about 4-5 km shooting up to 6 km (20,000 ft) occasionally, and heading southeast despite low level easterly winds.

Deflation continued at Eyjafjallajökull volcano. No indications eruption might end soon.

Eyjafjallajökull view from Hvolsvelli

Eyjafjallajökull view from Thórólfsfelli webcam (Heat Signature)

European Air-Travel

Meanwhile, airtravellers experienced more delays today as more ash clouds drifting from Eyjafjallajökull volcano continued to disrupt some flights.  Transatlantic flights faced severe disruption as planes were forced into long detours to avoid the ash cloud, thereby increasing flight times.

The air traffic volume was about 500 below the daily average of 28,500 flights today compared to 1,500 cancellations yesterday.

“We’re all at the mercy of the volcano and there is just no way of knowing how long it will continue to erupt. We would normally be getting south-westerly winds at this time of year and it’s pretty unusual to have northerly winds dominating the weather. It’s very much a day-to-day situation at the moment. The volcano died down a bit for a spell and has now got more active.” A UK Met Office spokeswoman said.

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Volcanic Ash Closes Parts of UK Airspace Again

Posted by feww on May 5, 2010

Iceland’s Volcanoes Could Potentially Cause Collapse of Europe

Eyjafjallajökull Volcanic Ash closes Airspace over Ireland and Scotland Once Again

Airspace over Northern Ireland and Scotland will be closed from 07:00 to 13:00GMT (UTC) on Wednesday due to a new cloud of volcanic ash drifting from Eyjafjallajökull Glacier volcano in Iceland, the UK Civil Aviation Authority said.

The ash cloud is expected to move further south, possibly forcing the closure of airspace in the NW England and north Wales today.

“The situation is very dynamic, so passengers expecting to travel from the impacted airports should contact their airlines to check whether their flight is operating,” CAA website said.


Volcanic Ash Advisory from London – Latest graphics   click image to enlarge


These images are monitoring for the presence of volcanic ash emission in the vicinity of Iceland using infrared data from the Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) satellite. Because cloud particles and volcanic ash particles interact with the infrared radiation in different ways, data at several different wavelengths can be combined to identify the main ash plume, which, when present, would be shown as yellow and orange colours in the images. Note that it is only the thicker parts of the plume that are able to be detected by this method. In addition, the ash plume is often masked by overlying high cloud. Source and Copyright EUMETSAT/Met Office.

A Webcam Image of Eyjafjallajökull Eruption saved by Icelandic Review yesterday. The webcams seemed to be out of action today.


One function of webcams is to prevent unnecessary traffic to the site of volcano, which could also be extremely hazardous.

Icelandic Met Office said:

Plume was observed at 5.8-6 km height (19-20,000 ft) estimated from the Icelandic Coast Guard (ICG) flight at 10:40 and 15:30 GMT. It is heading east-south-east to south-east from the eruption site. Plume track clearly visible up to 300-400 km distance from the eruption site on a NOAA satellite image at 13:13 GMT.

On lava flow they reported:

Lava is still flowing northwards, forming a lava fall down the steep hill under Gígjökull, about 4 km north of the crater. Blue gas is seen rising from the lava and white steam plumes are seen somewhat lower and mark the front of the lava stream. The size of the eruptive crater is 280 x 190 m. Lava splashes are thrown at least a few hundred meters into the air.

Status Report: 14:00UTC, 04 May 2010 – IMO and Earth Science Island:

Explosive activity and ash production is strong and has increased since yesterday. Dark ash plume rises above the crater. Lava is still flowing northwards, forming a lava fall down the steep hill under Gígjökull, about 4 km north of the crater. Blue gas is seen rising from the lava and white steam plumes are seen somewhat lower and mark the front of the lava stream. Radar images from ICG-flight today show tunnels in Gígjökull increasing in size and continuing the build up of the cone at the crater. The size of the eruptive crater is 280m x 190m. Lava splashes are thrown at least a few hundred meters into the air.

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Posted in environment, iceland volcanoes, Icelandic ash cloud, Icelandic volcano | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

Eyjafjallajokull Volcano: ASTER data

Posted by feww on April 24, 2010

ASTER data of Eyjafjallajokull Volcano

The following data have been acquired by the ASTER instrument on the NASA Terra satellite, and posted on Internet by University of Pittsburgh volcanologist Michael Ramsey. The data were collected both day and night. ASTER acquires data in the visible/near infrared (VNIR) and thermal infrared (TIR) during day time overpasses and in the TIR at night. The VNIR images are at 15 m/pixel resolution and the TIR are 90 m/pixel (each image covers approximately 60 km by 60 km).


Eyjafjallajokull Eruption Day time visible/near infrared image (13.5 MB) dated April 19, 2010.

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Posted in eyjafjalla, Eyjafjallajökull, Eyjafjallajökull eruption, Iceland volcano, iceland volcanoes, magma, Volcano Hazards, Volcanology | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Eyjafjöll Eruption – Images of the Day

Posted by feww on March 27, 2010

Hvannárgil Canyon Lava Fall


Photo Credit:
RAX /Ragnar Axelsson/via MBL. Image may be subject to copyright.


The Lava Fall.
Photo by Páll Stefánsson. Image may be subject to copyright.

Lava from  Fimmvörduháls crater on a mountain pass in south Iceland has changed direction the Hrunagil canyon into the Hvannárgil canyon forming a spectacular 100-meter high lava fall.

“There is a continuous flow of lava,” geophysicist Magnús Tumi Gudmundsson told Morgunbladid. The lava flow now extends to about one kilometer from the fissure.

Another Disappointing Image from NASA


A natural-color satellite image showing …  The image was acquired on March 24, 2010, by the Advanced Land Imager (ALI) aboard NASA’s Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite. Credit: NASA

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Technical information:

Webcams – Volcanoes in Iceland

Latest Images (RUV): http://www.ruv.is/flokkar/hamfarir

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Related Sites in Iceland (English)

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Posted in Eyjafjallajökull glacier, Eyjafjöll, iceland volcanoes, Icelandic volcano, volcanism | Tagged: , , , , | 5 Comments »