LIVE – Iceland: volcanic eruption in progress, discover the impressive images

A volcano erupted Monday evening in Iceland, a few kilometers from Grindavik, the town which was evacuated in early November due to intense seismic activity.

Images broadcast live by local media show jets of magma escaping along a fissure more than two kilometers long.

Follow the latest information.

She had been feared for almost two months. A volcanic eruption began this Monday evening in Iceland, south of Reykjavik, in the area where seismic activity had been most intense in early November. “An effusive eruption began a few kilometers northeast of Grindavík”announced the Icelandic Meteorological Institute (IMO) in a press release.

“The eruption began at 10:17 p.m. (GMT) following an earthquake around 9:00 p.m.”then clarified the IMO, noting that the estimated length of the fissure, around 2.8 km, is three times larger than that of the last eruption in the region.

Jets of incandescent lava

As shown in these images broadcast live on YouTube by Icelandic media, jets of magma escape from the ground of the Reykjanes peninsula which, until 2021, had been spared from eruptions for eight centuries.

This other camera installed near the volcano also allows us to see the incandescent lava coming out of the fissure.

On November 11, the 4,000 inhabitants of Grindavik, about forty kilometers from the capital, were evacuated as a precaution after hundreds of earthquakes caused by the movement of magma under the earth’s crust. Since then, they have only been allowed to visit their homes during certain time slots during the day.

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It is clear that this is a considerable eruption

Katrín Jakobsdóttir, Prime Minister of Iceland

“Our thoughts are… with the local population, we hope for the best, but it is clear that this is a considerable eruption”, reacted the head of the Icelandic government, Katrín Jakobsdóttir, in a press release on Facebook. In mid-November, the Prime Minister affirmed that“No country is better prepared for natural disasters than Iceland”.

Widely mobilized since the end of October, when a swelling of the ground was observed near the turquoise water pools of the “Blue Lagoon”, the police for their part indicated that the population was not in danger in the current state of the ‘eruption.

No air disruptions at this stage

“At the moment there are no disruptions to arrival or departure from Keflavik Airport”, indicated the operator of Icelandic airports ISAVIA, traffic being relatively low at this late hour. What will happen next? Difficult to say for the moment, even if vulcanologists recently noted that the situation will probably not be anything similar to that experienced in 2010.

That year, the massive eruption of Eyjafjallajokull paralyzed the aviation sector with the cancellation of nearly 100,000 flights with more than 10 million travelers stranded.

A land of fire and ice, Iceland has 32 volcanic systems considered active, more than anywhere else in Europe. The Reykjanes Peninsula has been the scene of three eruptions in recent years – in March 2021, August 2022 and July 2023 – which could be the sign of a new period of activity. A cycle likely, according to specialists, to last decades.

Follow the latest information on the eruption in our live stream below.