Posted on by Jón Frímann

New earthquake swarm in Katla volcano

After few quiet days in Katla volcano. It seems that new earthquake swarm is about to start in it. But this earthquake swarm did start with a ML2.8 earthquake (automatic size) at 10:55 UTC. This earthquake have been followed by smaller earthquakes. So far there have not been many earthquakes in this earthquake swarm. But the largest earthquake took place on what I think is the fissure where the eruption in the year 1918 took place.


The earthquake swarm can be seen here. Copyright of this picture belongs to Iceland Met Office.

The largest earthquake clearly has magma signature in my opinion. As it can be seen on my geophone recording of this earthquake.


The ML2.8 earthquake. This picture is released under Creative Commons Licence. Please see licence web page for more details.


High resolution of the Katla volcano ML2.8 earthquake. The bump later on this earthquake trace is the second earthquake that only had the size ML0.9 according to the automatic size estimate. This picture is released under Creative Commons Licence. Please see licence web page for more details.

There seems to have been some type of tremor event on Goðabunga SIL station just before the earthquake. I am not sure what event this was. But it does not appear on other SIL stations around Katla volcano.


Goðabunga SIL station. Copyright of this picture belongs to Iceland Met Office.

For the moment the only thing that can be done is to wait and see what happens in Katla volcano.

194 Replies to “New earthquake swarm in Katla volcano”

    2. Wonderful thank you!!! Great photography too. You kept the camera on the mountain for a long time which is what I hoped. TY

    1. Two possibilities: I can simply be an error – although it might not be a simple one, since the scientists for sure checked all the simple explanations at least ten times, before they blame themselves with something like this.
      The other possibility is that Einsteins theory is simply not big enough – and its going to be part of something much bigger. Like Newtons theory is only the special case for big objects and is an integral part of something bigger – in this case Einsteins theory.

    2. I like that they have essentially asked people to check their work. That’s the way it’s supposed to be.

      1. I quite agree Lurking however with something this big I don’t suppose they have much choice. If proved true it surely shows the limits of present human knowledge pretty clearly. In a few thousand years time they will laugh at the theories scientists hold now just as we do today at the science of the 1700’s.

      2. If they learned their science properly, they will not. Of course its easy to laugh at “the old days”, but keep in knowledge at this time in context. What was once worth a Nobelprize is now the basic knowledge which has to be learned by the undergraduate students. This is how science evolves.

      3. All experiments which discover something unexpected must be designed so the experiment can be replicated. This is obviously the case here. I too like the determination to almost disprove the findings by looking for flaws in the equipment and methodology.
        It would certainly make life simpler to disprove an accepted theory.
        As Chris has said this is more than likely a part of something bigger. Newton’s law is a fine example of where there are instances that do not follow the rule and fine honing is necessary.

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