A volcano that’s been triggering tens of thousands of earthquakes near a small village in Iceland erupted after weeks of anticipation, the country’s meteorological office said on Friday.
The eruption began just after 10 pm local time on the country’s Reykjanes Peninsula. That’s about 2½ miles north of Grandavik, a fishing village that evacuated more than 3,000 residents last month under the looming threat of an eruption and as hundreds of earthquakes a day were caused by magma shifting under the Earth’s crust.
“A Coast Guard helicopter will take off shortly to confirm the exact location and size of the eruption,” the meteorological office said about an hour after the eruption.
Morgunblaðið, a daily newspaper in Iceland, is broadcasting a livestream of the spewing magma.
The region (and Iceland overall) is very seismically active, but residents were reportedly shocked when authorities detected underground lava so close to where they live.
“In all scenarios that have been drawn up over the years, the volcano was always supposed to erupt around us, but not in town. We have never felt that our house might not be there,” Bryndis Gunnlaugsdottir, the former head of Grindavick’s city council, told The Washington Post.
The earthquakes have been highly destructive, damaging homes and roads. It remains to be seen what, if any, damage the volcanic eruption brings to the area.
While the eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano in 2010 spewed a giant ash cloud into the air, causing major disruptions to Europe’s air travel, scientists say that such a cloud is unlikely in this case.