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Update at 12:03 UTC on earthquake swarm in Nafir volcano, TFZ, 19-February-2018

Information in this article is going to go outdated quickly.

Uncertainty level has been declared in Grímsey island and nearby area due to the strong earthquake activity in the night. Largest earthquake during the night was a magnitude 5,2 the second largest earthquake had the magnitude of 4,5 at the moment. Based on how it appeared on my geophone it possibly close to being a magnitude 5,0 earthquake. Revision takes time when a large earthquake swarm like this happens. The largest earthquake was felt over a wide area in north, north-east and north-west Iceland according to reports by Icelandic Met Office.


Current earthquake swarm in Nafir volcano east of Grímsey island in the TFZ. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


Earthquake activity is high at the moment. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

There is currently no end in sight for this earthquake swarm. It remains unclear if this is due to a possible volcano event in the making or just tectonic activity. Currently there is no eruption happening at this location. Unlike what appears on the live updated maps all of the earthquake activity is located east of Grímsey island. The SIL network has problems properly locating the earthquakes automagically when a large earthquake swarm like this happens.

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Status of the earthquake swarm in Nafir volcano east of Grímsey island in Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ) at 15:53 UTC on 18-February-2018

Welcome to the longest article title (this might be like this for a while). Information here might go outdated quickly as the situation changes.

Currently the earthquake swarm is smaller today (18-February-2018) then yesterday (17-February-2018) with mostly small earthquakes happening. Largest earthquakes since midnight had the magnitude of 3,4 at 12:14 UTC. It remains unclear if this earthquake swarm is going to increase again, but at the moment it is currently ongoing.


The earthquake swarm east of Grímsey island. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


The earthquake activity is less dense today than yesterday. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

It is difficult to know what happens next in this area due to the fact that this area is under the ocean and is really complex due to mixture of tectonic earthquakes (strike-slip activity) and volcano earthquake activity. What seems to be going on now is a volcanic earthquake activity. There is no magma signature at the moment because magma has not started to flow to the surface. It remains a question if it is just a question of time now if that happens. There is no documented eruption history in this area and that makes everything little bit more difficult.

This article is going to be updated if needed.

Article updated at 16:22 UTC. Text fixes.

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Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ) earthquake update at 13:20 UTC on 17-February-2018

Information in this article are going to go outdated quickly.

As of the writing of this article total of 1593 earthquakes have happened in last 48 hours in Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ). The reason for this earthquake swarm remains unclear at the moment. It is not clear if this is just tectonic earthquakes or have their origins in magma movements.


The earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


This earthquake swarm is dense. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Largest earthquake since midnight has the magnitude of 3,7 so far. In the last 48 hours total of 27 earthquakes larger than magnitude 3,0 have happened east of Grímsey island. This earthquake swarm is happening in a volcano named Nafir (no GVP profile) and that volcano doesn’t have any documented eruption during the last 12.000 years that I know of (I might be wrong). It remains unclear at the moment if an eruption is going to happen at this location. At the moment there are no clear signs of magma movement, but ISOR (Icelandic article here) suggests that current earthquake swarm might be connected to magma movement in the area. If that is going to result in a eruption remains unclear in ISOR view.

I’ll update this article as needed today.

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Update on earthquake swarm in Tjörnes Fracture Zone (TFZ) at 11:19 UTC

Information in this article is going to get outdated quickly.

When this is written there have been 999 earthquakes in the last 48 hours in the area that is east of Grímsey island when this article is written. Most earthquakes are small in magnitude but can possibly be felt by the population in Grímsey island (~86 people).


The earthquake swarm east of Grímsey island. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


Dense earthquake swarm. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

This earthquake activity shows no signs of stopping as of writing of this article. Largest earthquakes in the last 24 hours have the magnitude of 3,1 – 4,1 and total of 12 earthquakes with magnitude above 3,0 have happened so far.

This article is going to be updated today if needed.

Update at 19:13 UTC

Total number of earthquakes is now at 1303. It is possible that I wrote the wrong number when I wrote this article earlier today. I might have been reading the wrong line.

Article updated at 19:13 UTC.

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Increase in the earthquake activity in TFZ (Tjörnes Fracture Zone)

Information in this article might get outdated quickly due to fast moving nature of the current earthquake swarm in TFZ.

The earthquake swarm that started on 28-January-2018 continues (article here). A strong earthquake swarm started east of Grímsey island almost 18 hours ago (it started around 18:00 UTC on 14-February-2018). Over 500 earthquakes have been recorded so far, most of them are between magnitude 0,0 – 2,0. In the last 48 hours three earthquakes with magnitude above 3,0 have been recorded.


Many, many earthquakes. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.


Earthquake activity is dense at the moment. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

At the moment there is nothing suggesting that this earthquake swarm is connected to any magma movement. It seems to be just connected to tectonic movements in this area. This earthquake activity appears to be taking place in a volcano but that volcano doesn’t have any documented historical eruption so it is impossible to know what might happen. Last eruption in this area was in a volcano south of current earthquake activity. That volcano erupted in the years 1867 December – 1868 January, Global Volcanism Profile can be found here.

I am going to update this article as needed as this activity develops.

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Hydrothermal activity creates dangerous ice cave in Hofsjökull volcano

Hydrothermal activity has formed a ice cave in Hofsjökull glacier (volcano details here). According to an announcement by Icelandic Met Office this ice cave is dangerous due to sulphur (SO2) pollution and that it goes above 60ppm. That can result in loss of breathing, loss of vision and damage to eyes and lungs. People should only enter this ice cave with gas monitoring hardware on them. One seven year old girl passed out due to sulphur poising some weeks ago in a trip to this newly formed ice cave. There is also a high risk of collapse from the roof of the ice cave as ice appears to be loose above it and can collapse down without warning at any time.

There is also a risk of hydrothermal activity increasing and that is going to result in more sulphur (SO2) gas in the cave and other dangerous gases coming up. This appears to the same location that had increased activity 15 years ago that also formed an ice cave. The reason for this increase in hydrothermal activity is unclear since no earthquake activity has been recorded in Hofsjökull volcano for the past 10 years. This means earthquake activity above background levels, one or three earthquakes are recorded each year in random part of the caldera or parts of Hofsjökull volcano outside of the caldera area. Höfsjökull volcano is on its own rifting zone (information here, related paper here) (marked as SRZ on some documents) along with Kerlingarfjöll volcano (it is now under GVP as Hreppar. I don’t know why that is).

Icelandic News

Veðurstofa varar við íshelli í Hofsjökli (Rúv.is, Picture, Icelandic)

Donations

Please see comment that I am going to leave on this subject.

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Small earthquake swarm on SISZ 6 km north-east of Selfoss town

Today (13-February-2018) at around 08:00 UTC a earthquake swarm started in SISZ just 6 km north-east of Selfoss town. This earthquake swarm is currently ongoing. Largest earthquake so far had the magnitude of 2,8 and was felt in Selfoss and nearby farm.


Earthquake swarm in SISZ today. The red dots show the location of the earthquake swarm. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Last earthquake swarm in this area was in 21-October-2017 in this exact same location (article here). No damage has been reported following this earthquake and in Iceland no damage is to be expected from a magnitude 2,8 earthquake.

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Magnitude 3,4 earthquake on Reykjanes peninsula

Today (12-February-2018) at 01:14 UTC a magnitude 3,4 earthquake took place on Reykjanes peninsula. I am not sure if this earthquake was felt by any people in nearby villages and towns.


The earthquake at Reykjanes peninsula. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

This earthquake was followed by several smaller earthquakes and largest aftershock had a magnitude of 1,6. More earthquake activity in this area is always a possibility.

Donations

Please remember to support my work with donations. Thanks for the support. 🙂

I got a small loan from a family member to help me to pay the electric bill since I did not get donations in time in order to pay it. I did get one large donation and I am thankful for it since it helps me to buy food for a large portion of what remains of February.

Please note that from June-2018 all donations have be moved to my Icelandic bank account and my Icelandic Paypal account. Since I will be moving back to Iceland in June-2018 and I don’t have any plan on move away from Iceland after that (I’ll just tourist abroad more for a longer period of time instead).

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Earthquake activity in Öræfajökull volcano

Today (09-Februar-2018) at 05:07 UTC a magnitude 3,6 earthquake took place in Öræfajökull volcano. This is now the strongest earthquake in Öræfajökull volcano since this earthquake activity started in 2017. With earlier earthquake only having the magnitude of 3,4 (article here) on 3-October-2017. This increase in magnitude is something to worry about.


The earthquake activity in Öræfajökull volcano (green star). Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Only one earthquake has happened after this earthquake so far and that only had the magnitude of 1,7. I am expecting more earthquake activity in next few hours and days.

Donations

Please remember to support my work with donations. I am few days away from not being able to pay my electric bill. I am still missing close to 114€ / 852DKK for that to happen. Thanks for the support. 🙂

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Earthquake activity in Öræfajökull and Esjufjöll volcanoes

I am writing about both Öræfajökull and Esjufjöll volcanoes in this article.

Öræfajökull volcano

Earthquake activity continues in Öræfajökull volcano. As before most earthquakes are smaller than magnitude 1,0. Earthquake activity is mostly in the caldera but reaches a little outside of it at times. Míla webcamera for Öræfajökull volcano can be found here.

Esjufjöll volcano

After a long time with no earthquake activity. Earthquake activity suddenly appeared in Esjufjöll volcano. As with Öræfajökull volcano, earthquakes do not happen in Esjufjöll volcano unless it is connected to magma movements. I don’t know anything useful about Esjufjöll since no eruptions are documented in the last 12.000 years. There might have been a small eruption in the year 1927 that lasted for 4 days, but I don’t have any useful information about that eruption if it happened. If an eruption does happen in Esjufjöll a glacier flood would go down to Jökulsárlón (this webcamera here).


Earthquake activity in Öræfajökull and Esjufjöll volcano. Copyright of this image belongs to Icelandic Met Office.

Donations

Please remember to support my work with donations. Current lack of money is making me a bit stressful due to the electric bill and that I currently lack the money to pay it. I only need 925 DKK (124€). I had to buy some food in last few days that explains the increase from 94€ earlier. Thanks for the support. 🙂

The regular donation button has been moved to my PayPal account in Iceland from PayPal in Denmark. I post updates on this on the donation site (link in the banner). The main PayPal donation button is going to changed to Iceland in June. After that it is going to stay like that since I don’t have any plans on moving away from Iceland after I move back to Iceland in July.