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.
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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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.
Thanks Jon as usual well written
I see an event on the Heklubyggð, Iceland webicorder that seems to run from 23:10 to 23:50 is that anything of note?
This is a storm in south Iceland. Just wind noise. No storm in north Iceland at the moment.
Ok now it makes sense thanks Jon
I just noticed its 8 in Reykjavik and its only 5 here!! there is something wrong with this picture, lol, we have 100% humidity 4 mm of rain in the last 8 hours and its still raining! this keeps up I may need plans for an Ark.
This is typical for the weather in Iceland. No rain in north Iceland at the moment.
Think Iceland is rubbing off on us out here. They just had a 7.1 up north of us in Alaska. Total of 89 quakes in the last 24 hours all 2.5 or higher. The USGS site I watch won’t show quakes under 2.5!
Jack, if you go to the USGS earthquake map and change your settings to “show all magnitudes for the last 24 hours” it should show down to 1.5 magnitude but only in the US. At least that’s what worked for me just now.
There seems to be a lot of quake activity at Dreki is this part of the swarm to do with events linked to Bardarbunga or a separate swarm from another origin ? I guess I am wondering if this is part of the same event that is part of Bardys restlessness or is this something that could be the start of some other event.
There is some increase in activity in Askja volcano, but at the moment it’s below background noise activity.
So these are part of Bardy’s or Askja ? :
Wednesday 27.01.2016 02:01:05 65.148 -16.257 3.5 km 1.6 55.34 5.0 km SSW of Herðubreiðarlindir
Wednesday 27.01.2016 01:37:26 65.219 -16.253 5.6 km 0.8 90.01 3.2 km NNW of Herðubreiðarlindir
No. This is a different system. It is connected to Herðubreið. I don’t think this area is volcanic in nature, it is highly active when it comes to earthquakes. Why that is, is not clear.
Details, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Her%C3%B0ubrei%C3%B0
Herðubreið is a tuya volcano.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuya
6 hours not a single ripple on the whole of Iceland is it still there??
Sometimes it is quiet, but not every earthquake is registered on the new IMO website. You can find the old website here, where every earthquake is registered.
http://hraun.vedur.is/ja/englishweb/index.html