For the second time in four weeks, a volcano has erupted in Iceland, with lava this time reaching a coastal town and setting houses on fire Sunday.
In the fifth eruption in the island's southwest since 2021, lava was spewing from both the volcano and newly opened fissures in the ground, prompting the evacuation of the coastal town of Grindavik.
An aerial photo from Icelandic broadcaster RUV showed lava setting homes on fire in the town where some 4,000 inhabitants had been told to evacuate on Saturday night after a series of earthquakes warned that an eruption was imminent.
"Today is a dark day for Grindavik and for the whole of Iceland. But the sun will rise again," Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir said at a civil defense press briefing late on Sunday, according to RUV.
"Together we will overcome this shock and everything that may come."
Civil defense chief Vidir Reynisson said that Sunday's eruption would be remembered for a long time to come and that they were probably just the beginning of a chain of such events.
In an evening address to the nation, Iceland's President Gudni Th. Johannesson called on his fellow citizens to stand by the residents of Grindavik and support them.
"We Icelanders are doing this together. We will not give up," he was quoted as saying by RUV.
The volcanic eruption on Reykjanes Peninsula, southwest of Reykjavik, began at 7:57 a.m. local time (7:57 a.m. GMT) on Sunday when the first lava gushed out of an elongated fissure a few hundred meters north of Grindavik.
Just a few hours later, the area was filled with a glowing red sea of lava. Volcano expert Magnus Tumi Gudmundsson told RUV after a helicopter flight over the area that the fissure had grown to a length of around a kilometer and was sending lava dangerously close to Grindavik.
"Lava is now flowing towards the town," warned the Icelandic weather authority Vedurstofa, as authorities called on would-be disaster tourists not to consider making a trip to see the lava.
Then, around midday, the earth also opened up on the northern outskirts of Grindavik. From there, the glowing red lava inched down the valley before setting at least two houses on fire.
Johannesson had said earlier on social media platform X, formerly Twitter, that human lives were not in danger but that local infrastructure and possessions might be.
Grindavik had already been hit by the last volcanic eruption in the area in mid-December – not by the lava, but by several earthquakes that announced the pending eruption.
This time too, the Icelandic meteorological authority recorded an intense series of earthquakes before the eruption. The quakes caused deep cracks in the roads and other damage.
A few days ago, a worker fell into one of these fissures, according to local media reports. The search for him has since been called off and he remains missing.
This time too, the weather authority recorded an intense series of earthquakes with more than 200 tremors before the eruption. The authority warned that magma was in motion beneath the earth's surface and that the probability of an eruption was high.
The last eruption in the area took place on Dec. 18, when lava initially gushed out of a fissure several kilometers long. However, the eruption decreased significantly in intensity within a few days.
