Quakes shake Iceland; volcano eruption feared

During the past week, the Icelandic Meteorological Office has recorded around 17,000 earthquakes on the volcanic island, according to reports. A CNN report said that although accustomed to the occasional tremor, this has been an unusual week.

On the morning of Feb. 24, the largest and loudest quake occurred, a magnitude 5.6 on the Richter scale, CNN reported. That quake was followed by “a swarm that continues to rattle residents in the nearby capital city of Reykjavík” and surrounding municipalities, an area occupied by two-thirds of the Icelandic population.

Þorvaldur Þórðarson, a professor of volcanology at the University of Iceland, told CNN that concerns about the recent activity are understandable. “Of course it worries people. For this region, this is actually fairly unusual, not because of the type of earthquakes or their intensity but for their duration. It’s been going for more than a week now.”

“We are battling with the ‘why’ at the moment. Why is this happening? It is very likely that we have an intrusion of magma into the crust there,” he explained.

With multiple volcanoes in the area, area officials have warned that an eruption could be imminent.