Category: Breinnisteinsfjöll

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Earthquake in Brennisteinsfjöll volcano / SISZ earthquake zone

Today (30.08.2012) at 11:59 UTC there was an earthquake with the magnitude of ML3.8 (4.2Mw) in Brennisteinsfjöll volcano / SISZ. But SISZ overlaps this area to some extend. So large earthquakes do happen in this area of Iceland on regular basis. This earthquake was felt in Reykjavík area, south Iceland and some part of western Iceland.


The earthquake location and the following aftershocks. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Meteorological Office.

In around 30 aftershocks have been detected in the area. More aftershock activity in this area cannot be ruled out. This earthquake did appear clearly on my geophones all over Iceland.


The earthquake at Eyrarbakki geophone station. This geophone is the closest to the earthquake. The most movement in this earthquake was on an N-S and E-W fault according to my geophones. This picture is released under CC Licence. See licence page for more details.


This is the earthquake as it was recorded on Heklubyggð geophone. It is the second closest geophone station to this earthquake. This picture is released under CC Licence. See licence page for more details.


Here is the earthquake as it did appear on Skeiðflöt geophone. This picture is released under CC Licence. See licence page for more details.


Here is the earthquake as it did appear on Hvammstangi geophone. This picture is released under CC Licence. See licence page for more details.

It is impossible to know for sure what this earthquake activity means. But earthquake activity in this area of Brennisteinsfjöll volcano did stop around 15:49 UTC. No aftershocks did go above 2.0 in magnitude. More earthquakes in this area should not be ruled out in the next few days to weeks.

Icelandic News about this earthquake

Alltaf von á eftirskjálftum (Rúv.is)
Skjálftinn á enda stórs misgengis (Rúv.is)
Verra ef safnið hefði skemmst (Rúv.is)
Skjálftinn hápunktur – ekki fyrirboði (Rúv.is)
Jörð skalf í dag (Rúv.is. Afternoon radio show about this earthquake in Icelandic)
Jarðskjálftasvæðið undir smásjá sérfræðinga (Vísir.is)
Má búast við nokkrum eftirskjálftum (Vísir.is)
Fólk hljóp á dyr í Litlu Kaffistofunni (Vísir.is)
Jarðskjálftinn var 4,6 stig (Vísir.is)
Á þriðja tug eftirskjálfta hefur mælst (mbl.is)
Jarðskjálfti upp á 4,6 stig (mbl.is)
Snarpur jarðskjálfti á höfuðborgarsvæðinu – Stærsti skjálftinn í 3 ár (Pressan.is)
Jarðskjálftafræðingur: Ekki búið að losa um neina spennu að ráði (Pressan.is)

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Minor earthquake swarm in Brennisteinsfjöll volcano system

When I was moving there was an small earthquake in Brennisteinsfjöll volcano. Because I was moving I was unable to track this earthquake swarm properly. But the largest earthquake was around ML1.5 from what I can remember. The earthquakes had the depth of at least 2 km. But I am not sure what the exact depth is. But I have not yet looked at the reviewed data on this earthquake swarm.


The earthquake swarm in south-west part of Brennisteinsfjöll volcano. Copyright of this picture belongs to Iceland Meteorological Office.

There has not been a lot of activity in Iceland during all summer. So I have not had lot to write about. But that might change without any warning. As is common in Iceland.

I did also move on 7th of August to a new town in Denmark. That means I am out of ADSL connection until 24th of August. So this blog is going to suffer from lack of updates until I am properly connected to the internet.