Business Day

Volcano leaves Iceland in the cold

- /Reuters

North of Sylingarfe­ll, Iceland —A volcano in southweste­rn Iceland erupted on Thursday for the third time since December, spraying streams of lava up to 80m into the air and triggering an emergency warning as thousands of households lost heating in the middle of winter.

Bright orange molten rock spewed from cracks in the ground in the Reykjanes peninsula and lava crossed a road near the Blue Lagoon — a luxury geothermal spa — that had to close due to the eruption.

The intensity of the outbreak had eased by Thursday afternoon, said the Icelandic Met Office, which is tasked with monitoring volcanoes.

The lava flow hit water pipes in the region just south of the capital, disrupting the supply of geothermal­ly heated water used to warm homes and leading the Civil Protection Agency to raise its alert level to emergency status.

Reykjavik’s Keflavik Airport also lost access to hot water, but said it had otherwise maintained operations as usual.

The temperatur­e in the area stood at -7°C and was forecast to drop to -10°C in the evening.

Rikke Pedersen, who heads the Nordic Volcanolog­ical Centre research group based in Reykjavik, said more than 20,000 people had lost access to hot water.

The Civil Protection Agency asked people in the affected area to use only one small electrical heater per household to prevent blackouts. Restoring hot water via an emergency pipeline that was already under constructi­on could take days, it said.

Volcanic outbreaks in the Reykjanes peninsula are fissure eruptions, which do not usually cause large explosions or significan­t dispersal of ash into the stratosphe­re. However, scientists fear they could continue for years, and Icelandic authoritie­s have started building dykes to divert burning lava flows away from homes and critical infrastruc­ture.

LAVA FLOW

The lava stream also came within 1km of the peninsula’s Svartsengi geothermal power plant, Pedersen said. As the lava flowed, workers were trying to fill in gaps in the protective dykes built along the road.

The latest eruptive fissure, the sixth outbreak since 2021, was roughly 3km long, Iceland’s meteorolog­ical office said. Intense earthquake activity began at about 5.30am and the eruption started 30 minutes later. A plume of smoke rose 3km into the air, according to the Met Office.

The previous eruption in the area started on January 14 and lasted about two days, with lava flows reaching the outskirts of the Grindavik fishing town, whose nearly 4,000 inhabitant­s had been evacuated.

Thursday’s eruption took place some way from Grindavik and is unlikely to pose a direct threat to the town, Icelandic geophysici­st Ari Trausti Gudmundsso­n said.

Icelandic President Gudni Johannesso­n posted an image of flames and smoke in the distance on social media, saying that was the view from his residence. “As before, our thoughts are with the people of Grindavik who cannot reside in their beautiful town. This too shall pass,” Johannesso­n wrote.

 ?? /Iceland Civil Protection ?? World on fire: A volcano spews lava and smoke as it erupts, near Grindavik, on the Reykjanes Peninsula, Iceland.
/Iceland Civil Protection World on fire: A volcano spews lava and smoke as it erupts, near Grindavik, on the Reykjanes Peninsula, Iceland.

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