Category: Volcano

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Minor glacier flood from Kverkfjöll volcano [Updated]

In a announcement from Icelandic Meteorological Office, an minor glacier flood has now taking place from Kverkfjöll volcano, it appears to have started yesterday (15-August-2013). This is one of the minor glacier lakes in Kverkfjöll volcano. This glacier flood in minor and the water levels are not expected to reach more than normal summer level in the glacier river the flood is going into. The glacier river is called Volga and is a glacier river from Kverkfjöll volcano glacier area.

Currently Icelandic Meteorological Office is taking a trip over Kverkfjöll volcano to see the local changes and what is exactly is going on. Current status of the glacier flood is not well known, but latest report suggested that some subsiding was taking place, if that is because the glacier flood is over or something else is taking place I am not sure about at present time.

Update 1: Icelandic Civil Protection has confirmed that steam explosion took place in Kverkfjöll volcano following the glacier flood (due to sudden pressure release) that took place during the night and in the morning. News about that can be found here in Icelandic.

Web cameras of Kverkfjöll volcano

It is possible to view web cameras of Kverkfjöll volcano here. Weather information can be found here.

Icelandic news about this glacier flood

Óvenjulegur vöxtur í Volgu (mbl.is)
Hægt hefur á vexti hlaupsins (mbl.is)

Blog post updated at 20:47 UTC on 16-August-2013.
Blog post updated at 21:29 UTC on 16-August-2013.

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New earthquake swarm on Reykjanes Ridge

During the night at 04:40 UTC a earthquake swarm started on the Reykjanes Ridge. There are no signs of this earthquake swarm being connected to any volcano activity, this just normal earthquake activity for this area. The largest earthquake in this swarm had the magnitude of 3.0, other earthquakes had less magnitude.

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The earthquake activity on the Reykjanes Ridge today. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

As with the earthquake swarm on 11-August-2013, this earthquake swarm happens short periods of activity with quiet between them. I do expect this activity to continue for the next hours to days, based on past history for this area. If that is going to happen I do not know yet. Largest earthquakes that can take place in this area can reach the magnitude of 5.5, but no larger than that, since the crust does not support any greater magnitude.

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Where has all the activity gone?

It has been quiet in Iceland this summer, often with only 100 earthquakes during the week (7 days) taking place. This is normal for Iceland, since activity takes happens in jumps, with long quiet period between them. That quiet period can be from few days and up to thousands of years. This is normal for every rift and subduction zone on planet Earth, activity happens in short periods and during that time a lot of things can be going on during that period. Between it nothing is taking place, this applies to Iceland as any other place on Earth. Currently nothing is happening in Iceland and tension is building up while it is quiet, at some random point at some random day this tension is going to break and we are going to have either a earthquake swarm, eruption or both taking place.

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All quiet in Iceland. There is currently some minor summer earthquake activity taking place in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

For more information on Icelandic geology, I recommend this paper (pdf) by Páll Einarsson. It is from the year 2008, but is a good read on the tectonic settings in Iceland. It might be a surprice to many, but in Iceland there are actually 5 rift zones, they are called Western Volcanic Zone (WVZ), Central Icelandic Volcanic Zone (CIVZ), Eastern Volcanic Zone (EVZ), Northern Volcanic Zone (NVZ) and South Iceland Volcanic Zone (SIVZ). Then there is Reykjanes Peninsula Rift (RPR). This zones are not all active at the same time and there dormant time is different, some areas are just dormant for few years to decades, while others are dormant for thousands of years.

For the moment it is quiet, so I have little to write about. Since this blog mostly deals with current activity that is taking place in Iceland.

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Melting of glaciers in Iceland might mean more volcano activity

In the evening news on Rúv tonight (23-July-2013) a interesting report about possible future volcano activity was being reported. A unpublished paper (according to Rúv News) reports that with more glacier melt in Iceland, more eruptions should be expected to take place. This is mostly true about areas like Vatnajökull glacier, as it holds several volcanoes that are under heavy pressure from the glacier ice. This applies mostly to volcanoes like Grímsfjall volcano, Bárðarbunga volcano and Kverkfjöll volcano, but those three volcano are the largest ones in Vatnajökull glacier.

This might also apply to areas like Mýrdalsjökull glacier. If this study is true, there might be more eruptions in Iceland in next few decades as the glacier melts away. This like so many other things, is however something that is just wait and see seranio.

At the moment, everything is quiet in Iceland when it comes to activity in volcanoes and on fault zones in Iceland.

Rúv News about this

Auknar líkur á eldvirkni með bráðnun jökla (Rúv.is, Icelandic, video)

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Minor earthquake swarm in Katla volcano

During the night (22-July-2013) a minor earthquake swarm took place in Katla volcano. Most of the earthquakes where shallow, with the depth of 1 km, one earthquake had the depth of 12 km. This earthquake swarm took place in the central area of the caldera. I am not sure what did create this earthquake swarm, it might have been a dike intrusion, or it simply might just be a pressure changes in hydro-thermal areas in this location.

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Minor earthquake swarm in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

This earthquake swarm is probably just part of normal summer activity in Katla volcano, at least there is nothing that suggests otherwise at present time. It is possible to watch the activity in Katla volcano here from my geophone at Skeiðflöt farm, just outside Katla volcano.

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Minor earthquake in Hekla volcano

A minor earthquake was detected in Hekla volcano on 21-June-2013. This earthquake was at north-east side of Hekla volcano, it had only the magnitude 0.6 and depth of 8.3 km. This is not at good detection according to Icelandic Meteorological Office person that I did speak to about this earthquake today.

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The earthquake in Hekla volcano to the north-east side. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

This earthquake is just one earthquake in series of earthquakes in Hekla volcano. While this earthquake was poorly located due to almost not being detected, I am sure that the only reason this earthquake was recorded is due to more SIL stations around Hekla volcano that have been set-up in the past two years.

There are no signs of eruption is about to start in Hekla volcano.

Blog post updated at 00:22 UTC on 22-June-2013.

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Minor earthquake swarm in Katla volcano

Today (21-June-2013) there was an earthquake swarm in Katla volcano, this earthquake swarm took place in the same area where the minor eruption in the year 2011 (July) took place and created a minor glacier flood down Múlakvísl river. So far there is nothing that suggest a eruption is about to take place in Katla volcano, this activity needs to be monitored closely since things can change quickly in Katla volcano.

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Earthquake activity in Katla volcano on 21-June-2013. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

This earthquake activity in Katla volcano starts around the same time as it did two years ago (2011), but then earthquake activity started on 17-June-2011 and continued until July-2011 and did not end until November-2011. This type of earthquake activity did also take place in June-2012, but no eruption did take place that summer. I expect this earthquake activity to continue in Katla volcano for the time being, sine most earthquake activity always happens during the summer in Katla volcano. It is unclear that is creating this earthquake swarm, it can be anything from pressure changes in hydro-thermal zones in this area, or magma injections at depth, I do not think any dike intrusions have taken place so far in Katla volcano.

Currently there is nothing that suggests eruption is going to take place soon in Katla volcano.

Blog post updated at 22:06 UTC on 21-June-2013.

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Fresh dike intrusion into Bárðarbunga volcano

Interesting earthquake activity continues in Bárðarbunga volcano. There is also interesting earthquake activity taking place in Hamarinn volcano. The source of this activity is magma dike activity in Bárðarbunga volcano. It is most likely not going to result in a eruption, but might be a sign of more activity in the future.

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Activity in Bárðarbunga volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

There has also been activity in Hamarinn volcano, I do not know if it is connected with the activity in Bárðarbunga volcano. I find it unlikely to be the case, but I cannot rule it out at current time. It is unclear if this is new earthquake activity, it might be as simple as new SIL stations in the area, or this could be real activity increase in the area close to Hamarinn volcano. I am currently not clear on this detail as is. Last eruption in Hamarinn volcano was in July 2011, I did write about it here. It is worth keeping a eye on this activity in the Hamarinn volcano, it has proven to be a unpredictable volcano and it appears that magma is at shallow depth in it.

Blog post updated at 23:32 UTC on 20-June-2013.

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Minor earthquakes in Katla and Bárðarbunga volcanoes

There has been minor earthquake activity in Bárðarbunga volcano and Katla volcano for the past few days. This is just a short overview of this earthquake activity.

Bárðarbunga volcano

A minor dike intrusion took place in Bárðarbunga volcano on 18-June-2013. This was a small earthquake swarm, with largest magnitude at 1.2, the most depth in this earthquake swarm was at 24.3 km. So this was most likely a magma dike formation.

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The magma dike earthquakes form a nice line on this IMO map. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

Katla volcano

A minor earthquake activity has been taking place in Katla volcano for the past few days. So far it does not mean anything, this is most likely a summer related earthquake activity as glacier weight gets less on Katla volcano during the summer. Some deep earthquakes have been taking place in Katla volcano, it is unclear if they are sign of anything at this stage. This is most likely a some magma dike intrusion at depth, it happens commonly in Katla volcano without resulting in a eruption.

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Activity in Katla volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

Other then minor activity, it is rather quiet in Iceland at the moment. With no special activity taking place currently.

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Strong earthquake swarm on the Reykjanes Ridge

Last night a earthquake swarm started on the Reykjanes Ridge, this earthquake swarm started slowly with just few minor earthquakes. It however did pick up later today with stronger earthquakes and more activity. Strong earthquakes in this swarm so far have had the magnitude 4.5 and 4.7 according to USGS/EMSC. There have been over 10 magnitude 3+ earthquakes, there is also a chance of more earthquakes with the magnitude above 4.0+ in next few hours to days. According to Icelandic Meteorological Office, there have been over 310 earthquakes in this area today (my counter is still offline, more on that later in this blog post).

This earthquake swarm has been showing the pattern of stopping and then continue for few hours, and repeating this pattern. This sometimes happens in earthquake swarms on the Reykjanes Ridge, why that is I do not know. Last eruption in this area was sometimes on the 18th or 19th century I think. If this activity is connected to volcano activity it is too early to know at the moment, at the moment there is nothing that suggest that is the case. That might however change without a warning if that is the case. This volcano is located out in the ocean, so it is poorly monitored so current status of it is impossible to know for certain. Currently there are no harmonics being detected, just normal earthquake activity and nothing else.

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Earthquake swarm on the Reykjanes Ridge. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

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Trace showing how the evolution of the earthquake swarm has been for the past few hours.Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

It is difficult to know for sure what happens next in this earthquake swarm. It is clear for the moment that this earthquake swarm is in full force as is, so more earthquake activity is to be expected. This earthquake activity can be monitored here, on my webicorder web site. It is updated every 5 min.

Other

I am sorry for this late blog post, but I always use some time to see how earthquake swarm evolve and what happens in them before I write, unless there is a really big earthquake with magnitude 50 or larger.

I have also been busy today trying to get my server computer back up and running, it has been working somewhat but I had to start from scratch again due to technical issues with few things. I am running FreeBSD on my server computer now. Since I am moving away from Linux solutions and it has been more of a challenge then I expected. I hope to have everything worked out now, so I hope to have my server computer up and running properly tomorrow. Since I know what I did wrong first time around and I did avoid it this time around, so I am not expecting any problems in setting up FreeBSD properly this time around.

I also want to point out that donations help me running this blog, since my financial status is not as strong that I wanted it to be. Thanks for the help.

Blog post updated at 13:26 UTC on 11. May 2013.