A volcano on Iceland’s Reykjanes Peninsula has erupted simply three weeks after the final eruption ended, spewing large partitions of lava towards the city of Grindavík.
Iceland’s Civil Safety warned residents and emergency responders to be able to evacuate the city at quick discover in a translated assertion.
The eruption began simply earlier than 1 p.m. native time (9 a.m. E.T.) at Sundhnúkur crater, about 2 miles (3 kilometers) northeast of Grindavík. Rising magma opened a 1.5-mile-long (2.5 km) fissure that’s presently throwing lava as much as 165 toes (50 meters) into the air, in accordance with the Icelandic Met Workplace (IMO).
The fissure seems to be rising, IMO representatives mentioned.
That is the eighth eruption on the peninsula since March 2021 and the fifth since December 2023. The final eruption continued for 54 days, from March 16 to Could 8, 2024. That eruption produced lava flows that narrowly missed Grindavík and a large plume of poisonous gasoline that traveled a whole lot of miles throughout northern Europe.
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The current flurry of volcanic exercise in Iceland started on Dec. 18, 2023, following weeks of localized earthquakes, which prompted authorities to evacuate 4,000 folks from Grindavík and shut the close by Blue Lagoon geothermal spa. Breathtaking photographs confirmed a wall of lava as much as 100 toes (30 m) tall erupting from an enormous fissure.
JUST IN: A brand new volcanic eruption has simply began on Iceland’s Reykjanes Peninsula, making it the eighth eruption on this space since March 2021. This one comes solely 20 days after the final eruption was formally declared over. pic.twitter.com/xU50fgI1tkMay 29, 2024
A second eruption rocked the Reykjanes Peninsula 4 weeks later, with a lava-spouting fissure shortly reaching Grindavík and destroying three homes. The volcano then erupted for a 3rd time Feb. 8 and once more March 16.
The eruptions are a part of a 1,000-year cycle of volcanic exercise that started in 2021 and will disrupt the Icelandic peninsula for hundreds of years to come back. The unrest is attributable to two tectonic plates which can be being pulled aside. The ensuing pressure is launched in bursts of seismic and volcanic exercise, David Pyle, a volcanologist and professor of Earth sciences on the College of Oxford, U.Okay., beforehand informed Stay Science.
“Every eruption releases only a bit extra of the stored-up pressure, and ultimately, when all of that pressure has been launched, then the eruptions will cease,” Pyle mentioned.