Category: TFZ

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Minor earthquake swarm on TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone)

During the night of 22-December-2017 a minor earthquake swarm took place south-east of Flatey Island on TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone). This was not a large earthquake swarm.


The earthquake swarm south-east of Flatey Island on TFZ. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 1,9 and the second largest had the magnitude of 1,5. All other earthquakes where smaller in magnitude.

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Small earthquake swarm in western Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ)

During the night of 6-December-2017 there was a small earthquake swarm on western part of Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ). Few earthquakes happened and the largest one had a magnitude of 3,1 and was felt in Siglufjörður village and Ólafsvík village.


The earthquake swarm area is where the green star is. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Second largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 2,8. All other earthquakes where smaller in magnitude. This area is a fault area and more earthquake activity can be expected.

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Magnitude 3,4 earthquake in Tjörnes Fracture Zone during the night

At 01:01 UTC on 18-November-2017 there was a magnitude 3,4 earthquake in western part of the Tjörnes Fracture Zone. A foreshock of magnitude 2,2 occurred at 00:30 UTC. Only this two earthquakes happened at this location north of Siglufjörður village.


The earthquake activity in TFZ during the night. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

The larger earthquake was felt in Siglufjörður village.

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One magnitude 3,7 earthquake in western TFZ

Yesterday (13-November-2017) at 07:36 UTC a magnitude 3,7 earthquake took place in western Tjörnes Fracture Zone. There where no aftershocks following this earthquake or any other earthquake activity.


The magnitude 3,7 took place where the green star is. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

There is not much else to say about this earthquake since no other earthquake took place following it. It was felt by local people.

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Earthquake swarm in TFZ close to Kópasker village

Today (08-November-2017) a small earthquake swarm happened west of Kópasker village. Largest earthquake in this swarm had magnitude of 3,0 and the second largest magnitude was 2,2 (foreshock).


The earthquake activity in TFZ. The green star shows the location of this earthquake swarm.

This earthquake swarm seems to be over at the moment but there is always a lot of earthquake activity in TFZ. Earthquake activity at this location has been going on for some time now with quiet period between them. There is a good chance that pattern is going to repeat in next few weeks.

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Strong earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone this morning (19-October-2017)

Today (18-October-2017) at 06:00 UTC (Icelandic time) people of Grímsey Island got a rude awaking when a magnitude 3,8 to 3,9 earthquake took place. At 05:01 UTC a magnitude 2,9 earthquake had taken place. For the past 48 hours total of 105 earthquakes have taken place in the Tjörnes Fracture Zone. The largest earthquake took place in what seems to be north part of Grímsey Island, there is no population in that part of Grímsey Island but the population lives only few hundred meters away.


The earthquake activity in Tjörnes Fracture Zone in Grímsey Island. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

This earthquake activity started in this part of the Tjörnes Fracture Zone on 05-October-2017 as I wrote about here. Since then it is has been continuously ongoing, for a time it looked it was slowly stopping but the earthquake this morning increased the activity again. Since around 19:00 UTC this earthquake swarm seems to have slowed down a bit again, but the earthquake swarm is still ongoing as of writing of this article. More strong earthquakes in this area cannot be ruled out.

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Ongoing earthquake swarm in Tjörnes fracture zone (TFZ)

Currently there is an ongoing earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone. This earthquake swarm has been going on since 05-October-2017. Over 120 earthquakes have happened so far. Largest earthquakes have had the magnitude of 3,9 (05-October), 3,5 (06-October), 3,0 (06-October). There is a good chance that in recent hours a new magnitude 3,0 earthquake has happened or is going to happen.


The earthquake swarm in TFZ as of 23:15 UTC on 06-October-2017. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

The largest earthquake are felt by the local population in Grímsey Island and the magnitude 3,5 earthquake woke up the population last night (night of 06-October). No damage has happened so far in this earthquake swarm. I don’t know how far away from the population centre this earthquake swarm is happening but the distance is not that great. A 1 – 3 km at the most from the looks of it. Any large earthquakes are going to appear clearly on my geophones and they can be viewed here, the geophone station in Böðvarshólar gives the best signal if an earthquake with magnitude above 3,0 happens in TFZ.

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Article updated at 23:53 UTC. Minor text fixes.

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Earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone (east of Grímsey Island)

Yesterday (01-October-2017) an earthquake swarm took place in Tjörnes Fracture Zone east of Grímesy Island. Largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 2,6 all other earthquakes where smaller in magnitude.


The earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone yesterday. Copyright of this image belong to Icelandic Met Office.

Around 55 earthquakes happened in this swarm that appears to be over. This part of Tjörnes Fracture Zone is highly active and has several earthquake swarm every year.

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Ongoing earthquake activity north-east of Flatey in Skjálfanda fjord (north-east Iceland)

Earthquake activity that started in March 2017 in TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone) is ongoing. I don’t know yet how many earthquakes have happened so far, but at last check Icelandic Met Office reported that the mark was at 800 and that was more then a month ago. The fluid that is pressuring up at this location between fault lines is most likely a magma in my view. If that results in a eruption is harder to say, at the moment the magma seems to be stuck at 10 km depth (in or around that depth).


The current earthquake at Flatey in Skjálfanda fjord. The location is where the yellow and orange dots mix (slightly east of Eyjafjörður fjord). Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

The earthquake activity at this location continues with little signs of stopping. What is also interesting is the fact the magma doesn’t seems to be making any progress up the crust at the moment. With fault line already in place the path to the surface is almost direct in this area if nothing is preventing the magma from moving upwards (impossible to know). At the moment this earthquake activity is limited to minor earthquakes and this magma seems to be lacking pressure to reach the surface at the moment. At this location there are no known volcanoes.

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Fluid reason for earthquake swarm north-east of Flatey in Skjálfanda, Tjörnes Fracture Zone

In March-2017 an earthquake swarm started north-east of Flatey in Skjálfanda in Tjörnes Fracture Zone. This earthquake swarm is ongoing as is. Largest earthquake this this swarm only has the magnitude of 2,5. All other earthquakes have been smaller in magnitude, since March around 800 earthquakes have been recorded north-east of Flatey in Skjálfanda.


Flatey in Skjálfandi earthquake activity since March-2017. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

There are two faults at work here, the first one is in north direction and close to vertical. The other is in the direction of NW-SW (around 145 degrees east) and has an angle of 60 – 70 degrees. Depth is around 10,5 to 11,5 km. Since March, according to Icelandic Met Office report the earthquake activity has slightly migrated north. As the earthquake activity has moved north, they have moved upward to a slightly shallower depth.


The NW-SW fault plane in the earthquake swarm north-east of Flatley in Skjálfanda. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


The fault plane that is almost directly north and vertical. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

There are clues in this earthquake swarm that it is caused by some type of fluid migrating in the faults at this location. What type of fluid this might be is not possible to know. There are no known volcanoes at this location or any historical accounts of an eruption in this location. I don’t know if there are many options for what type of fluid this might be pressing it self up at this location, magma is one possibility but this might also just be water moving upwards in the crust at this location.


Number of earthquakes north-east of Flatey in Skjálfandi since Marc-2017 until June-2017. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

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Article updated at 00:47 UTC. Location error fixed. I confused fjords in the area together.
Article updated at 01:47 UTC. I forgot the image with number of earthquakes at north-east of Flatey in Skjálfandi.