Category: TFZ

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Minor earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone

Today (11-April-2016) at 16:49 UTC an earthquake swarm started on Tjörnes Fracture Zone. This was a short earthquake swarm and only lasted for 15 minutes before it stopped.

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The earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 3,2. The second largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 3,0. Other earthquakes where smaller in magnitude. This earthquake swarm is over for now.

My laptop

My laptop is now showing clear signs that its about end its usefulness and a complete hardware failure is imminent. I don’t expect to use it a lot after Friday. If it fails before that time I won’t be able to post updates for the next two days (until 14-April-2016).

Donations

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Short overview of earthquake activity in Iceland

This is a short update of earthquake activity in Iceland on 28-February-2016.

Bárðarbunga volcano

Over the past 48 hours there has been earthquake activity and dyke activity in Bárðarbunga volcano. Some of this earthquake activity has been on around 15km depth. Suggesting magma movements within Bárðarbunga volcano system. Earthquake activity always seems to increase few hours to days after a swarm of deep earthquakes appear in Bárðarbunga volcano.

A dyke activity has appeared on the edge of Bárðarbunga volcano, it is located south-east in the volcano. In a area that has seen this type of dyke activity before. It is interesting that this activity seems to persist at this location.

Tungnafellsjökull volcano

Over the past few days few earthquakes have appeared in Tungnafellsjökull volcano. Some of those earthquakes have had the depth around 15 km. This suggest some type of magma movements inside the volcano, but nothing that suggests that its going to reach the surface any time soon.

Askja volcano

Earlier this week (Week 08) an deep earthquake swarm took place in Askja volcano. With earthquakes having the depth down to around 22 km. Suggesting that magma is flowing into Askja volcano magma chamber at depth. This has been happening at regular basis since 2010. At the moment there is nothing suggesting that eruption is going to happen any time soon in Askja volcano.

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Earthquake activity in Bárðarbunga, Tungnafellsjökull and Askja volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Katla volcano

There was some minor earthquake activity in Goðabunga in Katla volcano. This appears to be normal activity for this region of Katla volcano. No other interesting activity took place this week (Week 08) in Katla volcano.

Hekla volcano

Two earthquake where detected in Hekla volcano. Nothing else happened following this earthquake activity. Why this earthquake activity happens remains unclear.

Torfajökull volcano

A minor earthquake activity took place in Torfajökull volcano during the weekend. This activity is possibly due to changes in hyrdrothermal areas in Torfajökull volcano.

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Earthquake activity in Katla, Torfajökull and Hekla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Other than this activity things remain quiet in Iceland. There are few minor earthquake swarms on Reykjanes peninsula and Tjörnes Fracture Zone. But they are too small at the moment to write about.

Donations

Please remember to support me with donations. The new computer left a big hole in my budget and any support in order to cover it are welcomed. Thanks for the support. 🙂

Move to Denmark

It is now official. I’m moving back to Denmark on 14. April, with just few minor details left to work out (getting a loan for the apartment insurance and few other things). I’ll move into my new apartment on the 15th April. More details later next weeks when I know about the apartment loan.

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Magnitude 3,1 earthquake in Tjörnes fracture Zone (TFZ)

Today (04-February-2016) an magnitude 3,1 earthquake took place in south Tjörnes Fracture Zone. I don’t know if this earthquake was felt in nearby village of Kópasker.

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The earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone, the green star is the magnitude 3,1 earthquake. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

This earthquake swarm has now been going on for almost a month now and there doesn’t seems to be any sign of this earthquake swarm stopping any time soon. The activity drops at times, but always continues, even at low levels. Activity did increase after the magnitude 3,1 earthquake, but it has since dropped again into the same low it was before. I do expect this earthquake activity to continue.

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Update 3 on Tjörnes Fracture Zone earthquake swarm

Today (21-January-2016) the earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone continued after a little stop. This time it was the earthquake swarm on the south end (next to Kópasker village) that started to increase. The change happened around 02:30 UTC this morning and in the beginning a magnitude 3,1 and 3,6 earthquake took place. Total of three earthquakes took place with magnitude 3,0 or larger. The earthquake swarm was most active until around 06:00 UTC when it started to slow down. The earthquake swarm continues at this moment, but it appears to be slowing down. The largest earthquake was felt in Kópasker.

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The earthquake swarm on the south end of Tjörnes Fracture Zone. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Earthquake swarms in this area of TFZ are common and often there are several taking place over the year. I expect this earthquake swarm to continue for next few days. The risk of more magnitude 3,0 or stronger remains high. It is also a question if this activity starts earthquake swarm on nearby faults on TFZ. This activity is not connected to any volcano, this only tectonic earthquakes due to stress related changes (continental drift) in the area.

If any new development happens. I’m going to update this article.

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Website

I’ve been doing few changes to this website. It’s now possible to see latest comments posted. That can be found above the calendar. Now it’s also possible to go directly to my webicorder (geophones) website if anything happens when it comes to earthquakes.

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Update 2 on the earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone

The earthquake swarm on Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ) that started on 12-Januar-2016 continues. The earthquake swarm is now smaller then in last few days, largest earthquake in past 48 hours had the magnitude of 3,3 with the depth of 17,8 km. Number of earthquakes in the last 48 hours is only 53 at the moment.

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The earthquake swarm in TFZ for the past 48 hours. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

It is difficult to know for how long this earthquake swarm is going to continue in Tjörnes Fracture Zone. This earthquake swarm might continue for next few days at most. It remains a question if new earthquake activity is going to start in Tjörnes Fracture Zone, that sometimes happens, but not always.

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Update 1 on Tjörnes Fracture Zone earthquake swarm

For the last 48 hours around 217 earthquakes have been detected in south Tjörnes Fracture Zone. Largest earthquake so far had the magnitude of 3,2 with depth of 6,2 km. Current depth of the earthquakes taking place shows that this are nothing more than tectonic earthquakes. This is not a volcano related activity so far. I doubt that is going to change for now.

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Earthquake activity in Tjörnes Fracture Zone. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

New earthquake swarm also started south of the earthquake swarm that started on 12-Januar-2016. So far that earthquake swarm has remained small, but dense in the number of detected earthquakes. Both earthquake swarms are minor at the moment. The fault area that is moving moves 20mm/year in right hand move, the rift in this area is also 5mm/year. This earthquake swarm is also small, compared to an earthquake swarm that took place in 2013 along the same fault (article about it can be read here. Article about start of that earthquake swarm in 2013 can be found here). It is not possible to know if this earthquake swarm is going to escalate or not. Current activity doesn’t rule it out.

Weather notice

There is a good chance that what remains of hurricane Alex to hit Iceland next week if it goes that path. The weather system might miss Iceland but I don’t know at this point if that is going to happen. If the remains of the hurricane get to Iceland I’m going to write a weather warning if the weather forecast gets really bad.

This article has been updated at 15:26 UTC.

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Earthquake swarm in south TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone)

Yesterday (12-January-2016) an earthquake swarm started in Tjörnes Facture Zone, south part of it. The earthquake swarm it self was a minor one, with strongest magnitude earthquake at magnitude 2,4. Other earthquakes so far have been smaller in magnitude. At the moment around 92 earthquakes have been recorded, over the past few hours the earthquake swarm has died down a little, but it might pick up at any time or stop completely, it is not possible to know what happens next.

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The earthquake swarm in TFZ. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office (en.vedur.is).

Earthquake swarms are common in TFZ so I write about it frequently. This area can have eruptions (based on historical data), but nothing suggest that is earthquake swarm is nothing more than a fault line earthquake activity in this area. The risk of stronger earthquakes remains high at the moment, if any such earthquakes happens is impossible to know. A magnitude 6,0 earthquake hit this area 40 years ago, the epicenter of that earthquake is slightly more east than current earthquake swarm (news in Icelandic with pictures can be found here ).

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Please remember to donate. I put a lot of work keeping this website up-to-date with current activity in Iceland. Sometimes it takes me several hours to write a good article. Thanks for the support.

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Minor earthquake swarm on Reykjanes ridge and TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone)

The new year (2016) stars with two minor earthquake swarms in Iceland. Both earthquake swarms are small in both earthquake magnitude and number of earthquakes.

Reykjanes Ridge earthquake swarm

The earthquake swarm on the Reykjanes ridge started at 09:08 UTC and lasted until 11:24 UTC. The earthquake swarm has stopped for now, I don’t think it’s over at the moment. It’s difficult to know for sure if an earthquake swarm is over or not in this area, since earthquake swarms are complex and a minor earthquake swarm might start a bigger one few hours later.

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The earthquake swarm on the Reykjanes ridge. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

This earthquake swarm was small in magnitude and the largest earthquake had the magnitude of 2,1. The earthquake swarm is taking place in a volcano that last erupted in 1926 according to Global Volcanism Program. I however don’t think it is connected to any volcano related activity, this appears to be more like a rift earthquake activity.

Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ)

A second earthquake swarm today took place in TFZ. This earthquake swarm was small in magnitude and largest earthquake had the magnitude of 1,9. This earthquake swarm is also rather deep, with deepest earthquake having the depth of 21,9 km (if it was properly located). This might suggest that magma was at work here. This earthquake swarm took place in a volcano that last erupted in the year 1868 (they think) (GVP information). There are two volcanoes in this area and it’s not fully clear what volcano erupted in the year 1868.

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The earthquake swarm in TFZ. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

This earthquake swarm is continuing and has not yet stopped. It remains a question if it is going to grow or start activity in nearby fault, since sometimes activity in one fault on TFZ can trigger earthquake activity in nearby faults. At the moment that has not happened, but it’s difficult to know for sure at the moment.

Advertisements

I have changed the advertisements a little. Amazon US has a new advertisements that allows me to get paid by view of an advertisements, rather than just sale. This is working out good for me and has increased my income from this website a little from what it used to be. This also means that I don’t have to use Google Adsense to increase my income from this website. I continue to get from 1% to 10% of sales (I get more when it comes to special offers and such deals that Amazon is running all the time).

Donations

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Overview of week 44 activity in Iceland

This is a short overview of activity in week 44 in Iceland.

Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ)

Earthquake swarm took place in TFZ in week 44. Largest earthquake had the magnitude of 3,5 and other earthquakes had the magnitude of 3,1. Other earthquakes where smaller in magnitude.

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Earthquake swarm on the TFZ. Largest earthquake swarm took place where the green stars are. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

A second smaller earthquake swarm took place south of Grímsey. It is not connected to the stronger earthquake swarm east of Grímsey island.

Bárðarbunga volcano

A magnitude 3,0 earthquake took place in Bárðarbunga volcano. This suggests increased pressure inside Bárðarbunga volcano. I forgot to save image of last week activity in Bárðarbunga volcano.

Tungnafellsjökull volcano

Earthquake activity continues in Tungnafellsjökull volcano. As before all of the earthquakes taking place are small in magnitude. At the moment the earthquake swarm activity appears to be centered around the top of the volcano, one of the main craters. Earthquake activity is steady in Tungafellsjökull volcano at the moment. It sometimes drop down, as is to be expected when magma moves inside volcano.

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Earthquake activity in Tungnafellsjökull volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Skaftárkatlar cauldrons in Vatnajökull glacier

Recent survey of Skaftárkatlar cauldrons in Vatnajökull glacier has shown that the eastern cauldron has grown considerable in size. This is now thought to be the main reason why the glacier flood from eastern skaftárkatlar cauldron was the largest in recorded history. The cauldron is now 2,5 sq/km in size and 150 meters deep. Video of the overflight can be found here (Facebook). Measurements and other details can be found here at University of Iceland Earth science website (Icelandic). This are early results from recent survey.

Other things

Please remember to support my work with donations or by using Amazon. Due to problems with the Danish tax authorities I did not get my social welfare paid out this month in Iceland. Reason being that I have not got my copy of the tax statement for the year 2014, that I have . I hope this is resolved in November as has been promised to me. This however means that I have to use the salary for last months work to survive this month, money that I was saving in order to pay for moving cost when I move back to Denmark. If this is not resolved by December, I have to go on emergency income from my municipality. I won’t move to Denmark until this issue with the Danish tax is resolved. The temporary work that I was in is over so I’m going to be updating now when things happen in Iceland or close to it.

Once I’m back in Denmark I can start uploading detailed images of earthquakes and keep a real time watch about what is going on in Iceland. Its difficult for me to do that at the moment.

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Overview of the small earthquake swarms in Iceland

Over the past few days there have been few minor earthquake swarms taking place in Iceland. None of the earthquake swarms have been large, all of them have been minor and no earthquake did reach the magnitude of 3,0 or larger.

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The earthquake swarms in TFZ, Reykjanes peninsula and Bárðarbunga volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.

Most of the earthquake activity that has been taking place has been happening in Bárðarbunga volcano, minor earthquake activity has been ongoing in the volcano and fissure since end of the eruption in February-2015. A swarm of small earthquakes took place on TFZ, none of those earthquakes reached magnitude 2,0. Most depth in this swarm was around 22 km, so magma might have been involved, this area is a rift valley. I don’t know of any documented eruption at this location, that does not mean it might not have happened. Minor earthquake swarm took place on the Reykjanes peninsula, one earthquake reached magnitude 2,8 with other earthquakes having smaller magnitude . The earthquake swarm took place in the volcano system of Krýsuvík. This earthquake swarm appears tectonic in nature rather then volcanic.

There has also been a minor earthquake swarm in Torfajökull volcano, it has been on the none-volcanic area between Torfajökull and Katla volcano. It’s unclear why this is happening, there is a chance this is a earthquake swarm in Katla volcano on the edge of the volcano system, or this is a earthquake swarm on the edge of the Torfajökull volcano system. I don’t have my maps so I can’t check for it.

Other then this it has been quiet in Iceland this week and for the past few weeks, this quiet might continue for the next few weeks to months.

Article updated at 23:45 UTC.