Today (22-September-2015) there was an swarm of earthquakes in Katla volcano at shallow depth. Largest earthquake had the magnitude of 3,3 with the depth of 0,1 km. The earthquake looks long period from the looks of my geophone at low resolution (I will get the higher resolution back when my main earthquake computer is back on-line). Other earthquakes in this swarm were smaller in magnitude.
The earthquake activity in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Iceland Met Office.
Last week there was a swarm of earthquakes at 15 – 24 km depth (about) in Katla volcano. I did notice it and monitored it, I didn’t evolve into anything serious so I didn’t write about it. I don’t think the two activities are directly connected. This might be changes to the hydrothermal systems in the volcano or just normal activity for Katla volcano. At the moment I don’t see any changes in the volcano it self, even if there is deep earthquake activity taking place. For the moment, there is nothing to worry about.
A lot of activity around Bard today!
It is focussed on Bards neighbour, Tungnafellsjökull!
http://hraun.vedur.is/ja/vidvorunarsvaedi/index.html
Is volcano Tungnafellsjökull visible on any of the webcams at livefromiceland.is? Maybe at Bardarbunga? Does anyone know?
No, it’s not. Though it’s possible that when one of the Bb cameras was in scan mode during the H’raun eruption, Tung’ll could have been seen in the distance. So I imagine that if it does spring to visible life that camera, if it’s still there, could have its function changed, or a new one installed closer to T.
Ah, ok, thanks. To bad….
Looks like a serious earthquake swarm!
And now a 3.0 just happened.
Damn, I feel like we’re being seismically trolled by the Icelandig volvanoes at the moment
“Look at me! I’m swarming!”
“No, look here!”
.. et cetera
EQs in Tungnafellsjökull are all very shallow.
Lol yeah and then they are like ‘so are you paying attention? Good, now I’ll go back to sleep for a while.’ ?
haha, yes. precisely
Did you see the Specialist remark:
“This morning at about 7 am, an earthquake swarm started just north of Tungnafellsjökull. When this is written 11 earthquakes have been registered in the area. The biggest one was measured 2,9 at 10:57. Earthquakes in this region possibly reflect readjustments of the crust after the neighbouring Bárðarbunga volcanic crises which lasted for six months and started in the middle of August last year.”
http://en.vedur.is/
Well, that’s an obvious possibility, I’d have thought, but fissures and sink holes opened up in this area in ca. 2009-10 iirc, so perhaps there are other possibilities…
I’m inclined to think that this is a result of a dyke intrusion towards Tunga that occurred during the Bardabunga eruption. Now that Holuhraun has sealed up the repressurised magma is finding an alternate easier route.
An alternate route to where exactly? What does that mean in the short term?
I think where the route would be is a question no one can answer at the moment. Just an easier way for magma to reach the surface than the old dyke route. Interesting times! We have to wait and see! Jón feels there is quite a strong possibility of a future eruption though.
Sorry, I realise this relates to Katla so the old dyke route is not applicable.