A volcano erupted Monday night on Iceland‘s Reykjanes Peninsula, turning the sky orange and putting the country’s civil defense on high alert.
The eruption appears to have occurred about 4 kilometers (2.4 miles) from the town of Grindavik, the Icelandic Meteorological Office said. The town was evacuated in November after strong seismic activity damaged homes and raised fears of an imminent eruption.
Grainy webcam video showed the moment of the eruption as a flash of light illuminating the sky at 10:17 p.m. Monday. As the eruption spread, magma, or semi-molten rock, could be seen spewing along the ridge of a hill.
Magnus Tumi Gudmundsson, a scientist who flew over the site on Tuesday morning onboard an coast guard research flight, told Icelandic broadcaster RUV that he estimates twice as much lava had already spewed than the entire monthlong eruption on the peninsula this summer.
Gudmundsson said the eruption was expected to continue decreasing in intensity but that scientists have no idea how long it could last. “It can be over in a week, or it could take quite a bit longer,” he said.
The November evacuation of Grindavik meant few people were near the site of eruption went it occurred and authorities have warned others to stay away. “This is not a tourist attraction and you must watch it from a great distance,” Vidir Reynisson, head of Iceland’s Civil Protection and Emergency Management, told RUV.
Yet the spectacular natural phenomenon is hard for people to resist. “It’s just something from a movie!” said Robert Donald Forrester III, a tourist from the United States.
For local residents, the emotions are mixed. “The town involved might end up under the lava,” said Ael Kermarec, a French tour guide living in Iceland. “It’s amazing to see but, there’s kind of a bittersweet feeling at the moment.”
Iceland sits above a volcanic hot spot in the North Atlantic and averages an eruption every four to five years. The most disruptive in recent times was the 2010 eruption of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano, which spewed huge clouds of ash into the atmosphere and grounded flights across Europe for days because of fears ash could damage airplane engines.
Iceland’s Foreign Minister Bjarne Benediktsson said on X, formerly Twitter, that there were no disruptions of flights to and from Iceland and international flight corridors remain open.
Grindavik, a fishing town of 3,400, sits on the Reykjanes Peninsula, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) southwest of the capital, Reykjavik and not far from Keflavik Airport, Iceland’s main facility for international flights.