(Reykjavik) A new volcanic eruption broke out on Wednesday on the Reykjanes peninsula in southwest Iceland, the Icelandic Meteorological Office (IMO) announced, shortly after the evacuation by the city authorities neighboring Grindavik.
“An eruption began near Sundhnúksgígar, north of Grindavík,” the institute said in a statement, some three weeks after the end of a previous eruption that had lasted since March 16.
“The eruption plumes reach a height of at least 50 meters,” the IMO wrote on its site.
This is the fifth eruption in the region since December. The IMO had reported “intense seismic activity” before the eruption on Wednesday.
Eruptions in the same area in December, January and February led to the evacuation of nearly 4,000 residents of the small port town of Grindavík, affected by the lava, in November.
About 20 million cubic meters of magma had accumulated in the magma chamber beneath Svartsengi.
Svartsengi is home to a geothermal power plant that supplies electricity and hot water to 30,000 people on the Reykjanes Peninsula.
This has been operating, as a precaution, largely remotely since the first eruption in the region in December. Barriers were erected around the plant to protect it.
The popular geothermal baths of the Blue Lagoon, a major tourist attraction in the country, also evacuated all their facilities on Wednesday, a few hours before the start of the eruption.
On Monday, the IMO announced that around 400 earthquakes had been measured over the past seven days near the Sundhnúksgígar crater row.