Iceland’s volcano alley at it again with its third eruption in recent months

A volcano in southwestern Iceland erupted Thursday, lower than two months after a earlier eruption within the space compelled the evacuation of the coastal city of Grindavik.

The eruption started about 6 a.m. native time, sending lava into the air alongside a 1.9-mile-long fissure northeast of Mount Sundhnukur, the Icelandic Meteorological Workplace stated.

Agence France-Presse says reside video confirmed the glowing lava lighting up a plume of smoke rising from it.   

Coast Guard surveillance indicated the eruption was going down in the identical space as one which occurred Dec. 18. The Met Workplace stated lava was flowing to the west and there was no instant risk to the city of Grindavik — evacuated after a earlier eruption — or to a significant energy plant within the space.

Icelandic nationwide broadcaster RUV stated the close by Blue Lagoon thermal spa, one among Iceland’s greatest vacationer points of interest, was closed when the eruption started and friends had been evacuated to inns.

That is the third eruption since December of a volcanic system on the Reykjanes Peninsula, which is residence to Keflavik, Iceland’s most important airport. There was no disruption reported to the airport on Thursday.

Grindavik, a city of three,800 individuals about 30 miles southwest of Iceland’s capital, Reykjavik, was evacuated in November when the Svartsengi volcanic system woke up after virtually 800 years with a sequence of earthquakes that opened giant cracks within the earth between the city and Sýlingarfell, a small mountain to the north.

The volcano finally erupted on Dec. 18, sending lava flowing away from Grindavik. A second eruption that started on Jan. 14 despatched lava in direction of the city. Defensive partitions that had been bolstered for the reason that first eruption stopped among the movement, however a number of buildings had been consumed by the semi-molten movement.

Iceland, which sits above a volcanic sizzling spot within the North Atlantic, averages an eruption each 4 to 5 years. Probably the most disruptive in latest instances was the 2010 eruption of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano, which spewed large clouds of ash into the environment and led to widespread airspace closures over Europe.  

The Reuters information service notes that Iceland, which is about the identical dimension as Kentucky, has greater than 30 lively volcanoes, an enormous lure for vacationers.