COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – A volcanic eruption began on Friday in southwest Iceland, near the capital Reykjavik, after thousands of small earthquakes in the area in recent weeks, the country’s meteorological office said.
The eruption took place near Fagradalsfjall, a mountain in the Reykjanes Peninsula, located about 30 km southwest of the capital.
“I see the bright red sky from my window,” said Rannveig Gudmundsdottir, a resident of Grindavik, just 8 km (5 miles) from the eruption.
“Everyone here gets in their cars to go there,” she said.
More than 40,000 earthquakes have occurred on the peninsula in the last four weeks, a huge jump from 1,000-3,000 earthquakes recorded each year since 2014.
Images from local media sites showed a bright red night sky. A photo posted on Twitter by the Icelandic Meteorological Bureau (IMO) showed smoke rising from the bright lava flows.
The eruption posed no immediate danger to the people of Grindavik or to critical infrastructure, the IMO said.
“I don’t think we can hope for anything better than that,” IMO Volcanic Hazard Coordinator Sara Barsotti told Reuters.
Unlike the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull volcano, which shut down about 900,000 flights and forced hundreds of Icelanders to flee their homes, the eruption is not expected to throw much ash or smoke into the atmosphere, IMO said.
Situated between the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates, among the largest on the planet, Iceland is a seismic and volcanic hotspot, as the two plates move in opposite directions.
The source of the eruption is a large body of molten rock, known as magma, that has pushed to the surface in recent weeks, causing earthquakes.
The number of earthquakes has slowed in recent days, however, prompting geologists to say an eruption would be less likely.
Reykjavik’s Keflavik International Airport was not closed after the eruption, but each airline had to decide for itself whether or not it wanted to fly, IMO said.
A helicopter with scientific staff on board had been shuffled to observe the eruption, IMO said.
Report by Nikolaj Skydsgaard and Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen in Copenhagen; Editing by Leslie Adler and Matthew Lewis