Tag Archives: earthquake swarm

Iceland volcano likely to erupt after swarm of earthquakes, experts warn

Sundhnukur volcano

Important Takeaways:

  • Magma erupted from craters around Iceland’s Blue Lagoon resort on Tuesday morning, forcing its evacuation and those of settlements nearby, after the volcanic island’s seismologists recorded an “earthquake swarm” earlier in the day.
  • The community, located on the Reykjanes Peninsula, was largely evacuated a year ago when the volcano came to life after lying dormant for 800 years.
  • “The fissure is now about 500 meters (547 yards) long and has reached through the protective barrier north of Grindavík,” Iceland’s Met Office said in a statement. “The fissure continues to grow, and it cannot be ruled out that it may continue to open further south.”
  • The earthquake swarm began at 6:30 a.m. local time on the Sundhnúks Crater Row, Iceland’s Meteorological Office said.
  • “The swarm is between Sýlingarfell and Stóra-Skógfell, in a similar area seen prior to previous eruptions,” the office said, adding that it was “followed by a clear change in deformation and pressure changes in boreholes.”
  • “Both independent measurements were a clear sign of the onset of a magma intrusion,” the office said.
  • Jóhanna Malen Skúladóttir, a natural hazards specialist at Iceland’s Meteorological Office, told Visir they were monitoring the situation and it “looks like an eruption is starting.”
  • “A lot of magma has accumulated in the magma chamber and there is, for example, more seismic activity now than before the last eruption. It could be that she is trying to find a new place to come up,” Skúladóttir told the publication.
  • Iceland’s Meteorological Office had warned in the morning: “No magma has reached the surface as of now, but an eruption is likely to occur.”

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Naples, Italy earthquake swarm alarms officials of something bigger to come

Important Takeaways:

  • Seismologists, volcanologists, and officials from Naples are racing against the clock as they implement school closures, set up emergency shelters, and plan evacuation routes for residents living within the region’s Campi Flegiri area, also known as the Phlegraean Fields, after over 600 earthquakes have been recorded since Saturday, with magnitudes ranging from M2.0 to M3.9; the most and the strongest the region has seen in 40 years.
  • According to INGV, “the ongoing earthquake swarm is linked to bradyseism, a geological phenomenon in which ground levels rise or fall because of underground magma or hydrothermal activity.”
  • CCTV footage located within residential homes and along city streets showed the intense shaking caused by the mega earthquake swarm; the strong tremors felt in Naples city center. According to reports, structural damage and power outages have been reported throughout the area affected by the earthquake swarm since its conception, prompting officials to monitor the seismic swarm with a watchful eye.

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New Madrid earthquake swarm

Missouri-quake-swarm

Important Takeaways:

  • Sudden Swarm of Quakes near Missouri’s New Madrid Fault
  • After a period of relative quiet, there’s a sudden swarm of quakes that have been recorded along the New Madrid Fault on Missouri’s border.
  • If you pay attention to earthquakes, you likely saw that there were almost no measurable quakes along the New Madrid Fault for days. Now, the USGS is reporting a sudden mini-swarm of a half dozen quakes in the past day alone.
  • I want to be clear that there is no reason for alarm as all of the quakes so far have been relatively tiny with the largest only measuring 2.5 on the Richter Scale.
  • Earthquakes happen along the New Madrid Fault all the time. As we shared recently, there have been more than 175 New Madrid area quakes halfway through 2023 alone. But, we pay attention especially to swarms as experts now estimate a major quake could cause more than a billion dollars in damage which is double what was previously thought. The concern is that a swarm could signal a bigger quake about to happen, but earthquake science is still a field where there’s no way to accurately anticipate or predict a big event. Perhaps someday there will be.

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Earthquake swarm triggers volcano alert on Spain’s La Palma

MADRID (Reuters) – Authorities on the Spanish Canary Island of La Palma have warned that a sudden increase in seismic activity could herald a volcanic eruption in the coming days or weeks.

Spain’s National Geographic Institute has detected 4,222 tremors in a so-called “earthquake swarm” in the Cumbre Vieja national park, around the Teneguia volcano in the far south of the island.

As the quakes intensified and moved closer to the surface, the Canary Island’s regional government on Tuesday put the island on a yellow alert for an eruption, the second of a four-level alert system.

It said on Thursday there was no clear evidence for an immediate eruption, though warned the situation could evolve rapidly.

“More intense earthquakes are expected in the coming days,” it said in a statement.

More than 11 million cubic meters (388 million cubic feet)of magma have seeped into Cumbre Vieja in recent days, swelling the peak by around 6 centimeters, the Volcanic Institute of the Canaries said on Thursday.

Rising sharply out of the Atlantic around 100 kilometers to the west of southern Morocco, the Canary Islands are home to Spain’s most active and best known volcanoes, including Teide in Tenerife and Timanfaya in Lanzarote.

Teneguia last erupted in 1971 – the last surface eruption to occur in Spain – while a volcano off the tiny island of El Hierro erupted underwater in 2011.

(Reporting by Nathan Allen and Emma Pinedo, editing by Inti Landauro and Steve Orlofsky)