When did the Iceland volcano eruption begin? Nearly 4,000 inhabitants evacuated as precaution

Southwest Iceland had been facing intense seismic activity for weeks, but all that came to its grand conclusion on Monday night, December 18, when a volcano eruption started on the Reykjanes peninsula in the southwest. The eruption occurred only four kilometers northeast of the fishing town, Grindavík.

On November 11, around 4,000 people were evacuated from the small fishing town due to a series of small earthquakes caused by magma shifting underneath the town. Images and videos of the eruption showed the volcano violently spewing smoke and lava across the four km-long eruptive fissure.

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Volcanic explosion rocks Iceland

Seismic activity and shifting underground magma had been troubling Iceland for weeks, so much so that the citizens of one of the country's fishing ports, Grindavík, a small population of 4,000, were evacuated in November. The same month, the government declared a state of emergency due to a fear of a volcanic eruption.

Cracks had started appearing on the roads in Grindavík, damaging pathways and buildings. After the emergency, residents were only allowed to visit the village from 7 am to 9 pm. Although a few businesses had reopened, citizens were not allowed to walk throughout the town or even stay the night.

On Monday night, the volcano erupted from a fissure around four kilometers northeast of Grindavík. According to the Icelandic Met Office, the eruption began at 10.17 pm local time on the Reykjanes peninsula. It was preceded by an "earthquake swarm" that began at 9 pm.

Aerial observations declared that the fissure was further expanding towards the south. The southern end of the fissure was reportedly close to Sundhnúkur. The Met Office stated that the volcanic explosion happened on a "dyke intrusion that formed in November."

The first two hours of lava discharge from the explosion was at "hundreds of cubic meters per second." The largest fountains of lava came from the northern end of the fissures. There was a lateral spread of lava to both sides of the newly formed fissures that was accompanied by "significant ground deformation."

Icelandic seismologist Kristin Jonsdottir told broadcaster RUV that around 100 to 200 cubic meters of lava had emerged per second from the fissures. Footage of the explosion rocked social media users as the magma and smoke from the volcano burst across all directions, looking like a scene straight from a disaster movie.

The latest update by the Met Office on Tuesday, December 19, revealed that the intensity of the explosion was decreasing, according to seismic and GPS measurements. This meant that the explosion was "reaching a state of equilibrium." Regarding the size of the expanding eruptive fissure, the update stated:

"The eruptive fissure is about 4 km long, with the northern end just east of Stóra-Skógfell and the southern end just east of Sundhnúk. The distance from the southern end to the edge of Grindavík is almost 3 km."

An image of the location of the explosion provided by the Met Office (Image via Iceland Met Office)

Iceland has the most active volcano systems in Europe, totaling at 33. It was only in 2021 that a volcanic explosion rocked the Reykjanes peninsula in 8 centuries. Since then, three more eruptions have followed.

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