The eruption started round 8 a.m. native time on Iceland’s southern peninsula, officers mentioned, close to the place an eruption prompted the evacuation of the city’s practically 4,000 residents final month. Seismic exercise cracked the earth open and despatched lava spewing into the air, exposing one fissure that authorities mentioned measured as much as 3,300 ft in size.
Images of Sunday’s eruption, taken from a coast guard helicopter and shared by Icelandic police officers, confirmed lava flowing towards the city and lighting up the night time sky, threatening to swallow roads, equipment and buildings in its path. About an hour after the eruption started, officers mentioned, lava had reached inside 1,500 ft of Grindavík’s northernmost buildings.
Dwell footage aired by nationwide broadcaster RUV confirmed effervescent lava spewing smoke that stuffed the sky above the city. Because the solar rose, images from the helicopter confirmed glowing lava encroaching on the sting of the city’s built-up areas. Images confirmed development employees racing to erect limitations within the hopes of defending the city from the stream, as lava breached a close-by street.
In an interview with RUV, seismologist Kristin Jonsdottir estimated early Sunday that the lava would nonetheless take hours to succeed in the city even when it continued to stream in the identical route. “What issues is the place the lava is flowing. It is rather necessary now to observe it,” she mentioned. The eruption is round one-quarter the scale of final month’s in the identical space, she added.
Iceland’s meteorological company reported {that a} fissure had cracked the earth open round 3,000 ft from the city, southeast of Hagafell mountain. The fissure straddled either side of a defensive barrier that authorities have been setting up to guard Grindavík from lava flows, officers mentioned.
“The opening is south of lava stream deflection limitations which might be being constructed north of Grindavík. Lava is now flowing towards the city,” the company’s assertion learn.
Round noon, the company mentioned an extra fissure had opened up even nearer to the fishing city’s edge, past the defensive barrier. Officers mentioned that an underground magma tunnel more than likely prolonged beneath Grindavík however that seismic exercise had stabilized.
In response to RUV, the lava stream was near subsuming a business greenhouse on Sunday morning. “It’s solely a matter of time earlier than it goes below,” it reported. Employees have been dispatched to salvage equipment getting used to construct the lava deflection limitations, the outlet reported.
In response to the meteorological workplace, earthquakes shook the world beginning round 3 a.m. Sunday. Officers mentioned the extent of seismic exercise was corresponding to that recorded forward of a Dec. 18 eruption, though Sunday’s tremors have been farther south. Police urged individuals to not strategy the lava fountain by foot, warning that the bottom was unstable and that cracks and gases posed harmful dangers.
On Saturday, Iceland’s civil safety company mentioned police started evacuating Grindavík residents as a brief measure after a threat evaluation discovered that the city was unsafe. Authorities mentioned vacationers within the close by Svartsengi space, the place Iceland’s well-known Blue Lagoon is situated, had been evacuated.
On Sunday morning, Iceland raised the general public security alert degree from “hazard” to “emergency.”