Iceland has spent recent years marred by volcanic eruptions. The country saw in the New Year with violent activity along the Reykjanes Peninsula, where residents of Grindavik were forced to flee their homes.
It is one of the world’s most volcanically active areas, the result of being positioned where a continental rift and a magma plume join forces.
Of the volcanoes that look most likely to blow their lids this year, Fagradalsfjall comes out on top.
Geologists and volcanologists have been keeping an eye on the dome, which sits just north of Reykjanes and Grindavik and have identified “magma pooling” just beneath the surface.
Fagradalsfjall and Reykjanes are two separate and independent systems, though both are affected by the peninsula’s ongoing increased activity. It has erupted on several occasions in recent years, including in 2021, 2022, and 2023.
GeologyHub, an educational channel that documents volcanoes around the world, notes that “the rate of magma buildup suggests it could produce another eruption in the late summer to early autumn of 2024.”
There are, however, a few indications that any eruption could happen slightly southwest of that which happened around the 2021 vents.
Back then, the volcano saw six months of continuous eruptive activity, mostly concentrated in one large crater with a periodic outflow of lava of about 10-12 m3/s.
Its end was abrupt, and it remained quiet right up until 2022 when in August of that year weeks of tremors preceded another explosive event. Then, in July 2023, an eruption began after a staggering 900-metre-long fissure opened up along the ground’s surface.
Each event has generated considerable interest from locals and tourists, with thousands flocking to the land around the volcano to witness the eruption.
Volcanoes in Iceland have garnered a considerable bout of tourism, with some 12,000 visits to Fagradalsfjall recorded every day during the 2021 eruption.
Other volcanoes around the country are also becoming causes for concern among scientists, including Svartsengi.
The Icelandic Meteorological Office (IMO), recently announced that the volume of magma beneath Svartsengi is beginning to reach similar levels found before eruptions occurred between December and earlier this month.
Svartsengi is the spot of a geothermal power plant and the popular Blue Lagoon spa, which has only recently reopened to tourists.
The biggest issue facing scientists is the speed at which an eruption might occur. They say an all-out explosion could happen in less than 30 minutes.
