This morning there was a strong earthquake swarm in Katla volcano. At the writing of this article the largest earthquake had a magnitude of Mw4,8 and the second largest earthquake had a magnitude of Mw4,7, the third largest earthquake had a magnitude of Mw4,5. This earthquakes where felt in nearby farms and towns close to Katla volcano. Currently, a lot of smaller earthquakes have happened in Katla volcano.
Earthquake activity in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
There are no changes in harmonic tremor levels at the writing of this article. That makes an eruption unlikely to happen now. That might change later without warning. The air aviation code has been moved to yellow and can be viewed here.
I’ll write a new article if something more happens.
This morning (25. April 2023) an earthquake swarm started north of Grindavík town, next to the Blue Lagoon. This earthquake swarm is ongoing at the writing of this article. If this is going to result in a eruption is impossible to know. The magma has reached the depth of 2 km and that is not good news if this continues to intensify. Large earthquakes do not need to happen before an eruption starts under the correct conditions in the curst and there has been a lot of dyke activity in Reykjanes volcano in last 3 years. Without that activity resulting in a eruption.
Earthquake activity north of Grindavík town. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
Eruption at this location would be bad, because of the tourist infrastructure next to this location that is the Blue Lagoon. Only thing that can be done now is to monitor the situation and see if it changes from what is currently happening.
It is possible to view the earthquake swarm in high resolution on Skjálfta-Lísa and other private websites that have similar maps.
Today (23. April 2023) at 15:!5 UTC an earthquake swarm took place in Grímsfjall volcano. Largest earthquake in this swarm had a magnitude of Mw3,3. Few other smaller earthquakes also took place.
Earthquake activity in Grímsfjall volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
There are no signs that Grímsfjall volcano is about erupt following this earthquake swarm. That might change without warning, but seems unlikely to happen at the moment. More earthquakes might happen in next few hours.
Today (13. April 2023) there has been a small earthquake swarm in south part of Brennisteinfjöll volcano. This location had an earthquake swarm few weeks ago at this same location. It also was small in magnitude. Depth of this earthquake swarm has now decreased from 7 km to around 3 km. At least that is what it seems, based on the current earthquake data.
Earthquake activity in Brennisteinsfjöll volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
This earthquake activity shows a sign of magma movement. It is my opinion that the magma is now pushing it self trough the crust at this location. That can take a while, up to several weeks before an eruption starts. I did see something similar happen before the Bárðarbunga volcano eruption in 2014. That process took good three months before the eruption and was marked by small earthquake swarm like this one. How long this is going to take is impossible to know, because what type of crust is at this location is not well understood (outside of types of rock it is made out of at the first top layers). This is in my view an earthquake activity that needs to be monitored, because of possible eruption risk at this location. This is directly north of a small lake south of the earthquake swarm. If an eruption happens and the lava flows into the lake, that might create a lot of problems.
This earthquake swarm can be viewed here in more details. The website is Skjálfta-Lísa and is only in Icelandic.
An earthquake swarm in a volcano called Fremrinámar today (30. March 2023). This is the first time I’ve seen an earthquake swarm in this volcano. All earthquakes where small in magnitude and the magnitude range was from Mw0,1 to Mw1,0. Depth was 5,8 km to 9,1 km.
Fremrinámar is located south of Krafla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
This is the first time I’ve seen an earthquake activity in this volcano. I’ve been monitoring earthquake activity for close to 30 years at the writing of this article. Last eruption in Fremrinámar volcano took place around 3200 years ago (1200 BCE according to Global Volcanism Program). There is a second (and I assume newly discovered) volcano north of Fremrinámar volcano and south of Krafla volcano called Heiðarsporðar. That volcano last erupted around 2200 years ago. This earthquake activity doesn’t seems to be in that volcano, but this map on Icelandic Met Office website is not fully up to date it seems. Based on the volcano website Catalogue of Icelandic Volcanoes. This earthquake activity is only mentioned here now, because I’ve never seen an earthquake swarm in this volcano before.
Today (19. March 2023) at 14:59 UTC an earthquake with magnitude of Mw3,1 took place in Bárðarbunga volcano. This is normal earthquake activity and shows the inflation that is happening in Bárðarbunga volcano is ongoing after the end of the eruption in 2015.
Earthquake activity in Bárðarbunga volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
This type of earthquake activity happens once to twice a month with a earthquake close to magnitude five happening every three to four months. This earthquake activity is getting lower with time, it is likely that it is going to take few more years until it completely stops.
Since end of February 2023 there have been slowly growing signs in form of a small earthquake activity in Fagradalsfjall volcano and nearby area. It is impossible to know when next eruption starts in Fagradalsfjall volcano, but last time the quiet time was around 10 months. If it is going to be shorter or longer now is impossible to know.
Earthquake activity in Fagradalsfjall volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
Currently the earthquake activity is minor, but that can change quickly and without much warning. At the writing of this article, its been 6 months and 24 days since the eruption in Meradalir valley ended. I don’t know if this is going to happen the same was as it did before last eruption. Since there’s a lot of magma at depth of 5 to 10 km now and that changes how everything functions and behaves in the crust.
Yesterday (14. March 2023) at 20:43 UTC an magnitude Mw3,0 earthquake took place in Askja volcano. This is just one of smaller earthquakes in Askja volcano. There have been almost no earthquake activity following the inflation in Askja volcano in recent months. Suggesting to me (this is my personal opinion) that this inflation is not going to result in a eruption. Deflation might start in few months or years time, if it starts at all. Why this happens the way it does is unknown to me.
Earthquake activity in Askja volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
It is my personal view that earthquake activity in Askja volcano is going remain low and even vanish for a time. I don’t think anything is going to happen this time around. I am however known to get this wrong, because nobody can be sure what happens next in a volcano.
This morning (11. March 2023) at 07:02 UTC an earthquake with magnitude of Mw3,1 took place in western part of Katla volcano. This earthquake happened in Katla volcano caldera rim. The depth was 1,1 km. This was a single earthquake, at the writing of this article.
Earthquake activity in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
Since this earthquake there has not been any new earthquake activity in Katla volcano. I am not sure why that is, but it there’s a chance this earthquake activity might just be over. There has been a lot of frost quakes in last few hours, because of a cold weather happening in Iceland. With freezing going down to -20C in some areas.
Today (9. March 2023) an earthquake swarm started in Katla volcano. This earthquake swarm is ongoing and information in this article can go outdated quickly. Largest earthquakes at the writing of this article have a magnitude of Mw3,3 and Mw3,4. A swarm of smaller earthquakes is ongoing.
Earthquake activity in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.
It is difficult to know for sure what is going on in Katla volcano. But this activity reminds me of what happened few years ago before an small eruption took place in Katla volcano. If that is going to happen now I don’t know. I’ll post information when I know more and if anything more happens in Katla volcano.
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