The heat is on

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,In the forests of the night (William Blake, The Tyger) Lava is lovely. The warm (or hot) red colour gives it beauty, and the intricate movement of a lava flow makes it mesmerizing. But it is at night that the lava really comes to life. What appeared shiny black in the light…

Iceland’s subglacial Skaftar-sized events

Due to the ongoing Reykjanes activity, I’ve grown interested in subglacial Icelandic lava flows. When lava is erupted under an ice cap, it tends to pile up rather than flow away. It makes a conical or ridge-like mound of pillow lavas known as a tindar. When lava reaches the surface of the glacier, it starts…

Big basalt blasts I. The trigger

Rhyolite has more silica, this makes it more viscous, more explosive and in turn more dangerous. Basalt is the opposite, fluid, well-behaved, safe. This could be a phrase out of any geology textbook, I can almost feel some readers getting ahead of me and thinking what I am obliged to say. But there are exceptions!…

The 3 x 4½ km summit caldera of Mount Katmai, Alaska, that formed after the 1912 VEI 6 Novarupta eruption (Wiki)

Calderas

This is a re-post that has been re-posted before. But we attract new readers and sometimes it is worth republishing something. Especially since this is about Icelandic (and other) calderas, something that has been raised in the comments recently. This post was originally written during the Holuhraun eruption and associated Bardarbunga collapse, and you will…

Volcano ecology

Space is a precious resource. We hoard it and guard it. Together with air, water, warmth and tomato ketchup, it is one of the essential ingredients for life. We are happy to share empathy, food, and money, but letting someone else invade our personal space is a big step well beyond that. Social distancing is…

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Holohraun Five Years Later

A guest post from Salting I visited Iceland many times in the past to meet friends and take a day off on my way between Europa and US. In summer 2011 I made an extra-long stop and visited a glacier to better understand the forces that shaped the coastline around my Swedish home island. Trekking…

Getting to Greíps with things

In this article I will pick up with the questions regarding age, GPS-tracks and the general setting. Knowing me it is quite likely that I will meander out into wild tangents as I go. Time to Greíp my pen.   The age of Greíp For a volcano that has not erupted (we will get back…

Greip Expectations

  Part 1 of a Greip Series This week, under the rumblings of Torfajökull, we return to one of our favourite areas within Vatnajökull that is yet to show it’s true hand. Or has it already and is there evidence to support that? Due to some recent activity, Carl has been getting increasingly excited in…

On the importance of Deep Quacks

Back in early 2011 I was sitting down for a late light evening read of “Lower-crustal earthquakes caused by magma movement beneath Askja volcano on the north Icelandic rift” by Soosalu et al. As I read angels started to sing a glorious hymn as I had an epiphany and my view on how volcanoes operate…

Living Dangerously – Grimsvötn Forecasted

In August of 2017 Albert and I stuck our necks out on a limb and made a forecast each of what the future pattern of Grimsvötn was most likely to be. Or in other words, when would it erupt next. As I reread our two separate forecasts, I am struck by how different methodologies we…