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Scientists estimate the Fagradalsfjall volcano on Iceland’s Reykjanes peninsula has a few days, or even hours before it erupts.
Magma is rapidly building up to a depth of 5 kilometers below the ground in the south-west of the country, where more than 3,000 residents of the town of Grindavik fled their homes to escape an apocalyptic landscape.
BREAKING – #Iceland: #Fagradalsfjall volcano begins to show first signs of eruption.
Iceland has declared a state of emergency after a series of #earthquakes#Grindavíkurbær #iceland#ReykjanesPeninsula#Fagradalsfjall #Grindavík #volcano
📹 Robert Hodgin#Grindavik #BlueLagoon… pic.twitter.com/zq5CWl6y17— X Posterity (@NewXPosterity) November 13, 2023
Last night was more quiet for the region, which is under a state of emergency, as “only” 880 earthquakes below magnitude 3 were recorded during the night, significantly fewer than the roughly 2,000 tremors recorded the last two days.
Images from the area are heartbreaking: The ground has been split in two, roads have been destroyed, but the worst, scientists say, may be yet to come.
If the volcano erupts, the town of Grindavik will likely disappear from the face of the earth.
The Meteorological Service of Iceland, measuring the amount of underground magma intrusion and the rate at which it is moving, announced that there is a “significant risk” of an eruption from the volcano which has been inactive for 800 years, before 2021 when it first showed activity.
Volcanology professor at the University of Iceland, Thorvaldur Thordarson, speaking to state broadcaster RUV was more specific: “I don’t think an eruption will take long, hours or a few days. The possibility of an explosion has increased significantly”.
And what if it explodes? In this case, scientists such as volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson warn that the volcano “could wipe out the entire town of Grindavik”, from which all its inhabitants were evacuated. And they explain that this eruption could be worse than the eruption of Vestmannaeyjar, which, half a century ago, had destroyed the city.
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The residents left everything behind, and they share the opinion that the city and the surrounding area will be destroyed.
“The scenario that’s on the table now is that it will happen in the town of Grindavik or just north of it. There is no good choice here”, says one resident of Grindavik who has left.
The Iceland Fagradalsfjall Volcano is becoming more active, pushing massive amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere, causing climate change.
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Environmentalists like Guilbeault will blame humans#Reykjavíkpic.twitter.com/MGhIR9eb0E…— sonofabench (@therealmrbench) November 12, 2023
Yesterday, after a wide-ranging meeting between the heads of the Meteorological Service and the University of Iceland, scientists allowed residents to return to their homes for a few hours to get what they could from them before leaving the area again.
Volcanologists have recorded a 15km-long magma ‘river’ moving beneath the town and fear the volcano will erupt directly beneath it.
And that would be the most disastrous scenario…
