A small fissure erupted in Iceland near the subglacial Bardarbunga volcano, prompting Iceland’s authorities to raise the aviation warning code to red on Saturday before lowering it again in the evening. The country’s meteorological agency described the eruption in the Holuhraun lava field—about 5 kilometres north of the Dyngjujoekull glacier—as a “calm eruption”. Nevertheless, Icelandic aviation authorities have closed the airspace around the eruption area up to 1,823 metres.
It is a very calm lava eruption that can hardly be seen on seismometers.
Iceland’s Met Office
Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano erupted in 2010, producing ash that disrupted air travel across Europe. Sunday’s eruption in the Holuhraun lava field area was “calm but continuous”, authorities said. It happened in roughly the same place as an earlier eruption on Friday morning, and is the third to happen in the area in the last week. Earlier on a Friday, a volcano in eastern Papua New Guinea erupted, disrupting flights and spewing rocks and ash into the air. Mount Tavurvur on New Britain Island forced local communities to evacuate.