Jill Lawless.
Iceland has an unpredictable nature, but is now enjoying the silver lining to that 2010 cloud. By
An Icelandic volcano brought much of the world’s air travel to a halt. And then it brought the world to Iceland.
Few outside this island nation had heard of Eyjafjallajokull – and even fewer could pronounce it – when the volcano erupted in April 2010 after two centuries of silence, spewing an ash cloud that closed Europe’s airspace and grounded millions of travellers.
Iceland responded to its global notoriety with savvy selfpromotion, sparking a tourism boom to a country whose landscape of hardened lava, gushing geysers and steaming hot springs has a stark beauty that’s like nowhere else on Earth.
So the prospect of a new eruption brings a mix of trepidation and anticipation. ‘‘We are kind of waiting for it,’’ said Thordis Olafsdottir, who runs the tourist office in Vik, a village at the base of Katla, a volcano that recently began rumbling after decades of quiet.
‘‘It has been almost 100 years since it erupted.’’
Like many Icelanders, Olafsdottir has a matter-of-fact attitude to life on this unpredictable island, whose hazards include earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, avalanches and floods, as well as volatile North Atlantic weather that can bring rain, sleet, hail, snow and sunshine in one day.
Iceland is home to 32 active volcanic sites, and its history is punctuated with eruptions, some of them catastrophic. The 1783 eruption of Laki spewed a toxic cloud over Europe, killing tens of thousands of people and sparking famine when crops failed. Some historians cite it as a contributing factor to the French Revolution. Most other volcanoes remained largely a local threat – until Eyjafjallajokull blew its top in April 2010. Aviation authorities closed much of European airspace for five days out of fears volcanic