Iceland on high alert for volcanic eruption following thousands of tremors

Iceland is on high alert for a possible volcano eruption on the south-western point near the capital Reykjavik.

More than 20,000 earthquakes have taken place in the past weeks in an area that hasn’t seen volcanic activity for the past 800 years.

Pall Einarsson, Professor Emeritus of Geophysics at the University of Iceland says big earthquake ranges are not still of. “But this is the first time we understand it here in the area of the capital of Iceland, Reykjavik and it’s a new life for a lot of people now, to feel aftershocks every day.”

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Plans are up to make sure heavy machines can be drafted in to make ditches and earth walls to alter the way of any molten lava, should an eruption occur. Similar precautions were also taken in 1973 to save the main town on nearby Heimaey island.

So far the tremors have not made important damage, at the moment the activity is more of a nuisance.

Sigurdur Oli Thorleifsson, leader of Grindavik council, has returned back home after leaving the area in order to get much-needed sleep. “We were outside, unloading the car. The earth shook outside and when I came in with the luggage, the kitchen bar was on its one side. And various things had also come out of cupboards.”

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Natural hazard experts are currently on duty 24-hours a day in case of volcanic activity.

If there is an eruption it is assumed to be mainly lava, unlike the 2010 eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano, whose huge tufts of ash interrupted air traffic for weeks in Europe and left millions of travelers stranded.