Katla volcano watch anyone?

[MrSlant]

I remember when the last eruption was going on in Iceland I learned an awful lot from knowledgable MN'ers about volcanos and seismic activity, plus you all had links to the best websites.

Apparently it is not 'if' but 'when' Katla is going to erupt so anyone want to join me and educate me and save me finding all the good links again?

[Needmyowndesertisland]

Joining you in the hope I'll learn something too! That'll have an effect on the weather

[MrSlant]

Here's the volcano's Wikipedia page. There was a link before to a fantastic site run by brilliant scientists that I got quite addicted to, learned all about tremors and their meanings and placements but I can't find it any more. Hopefully someone will provide a link and I can ignore all the back to school business and look at that instead!

[juneau]

Its been 'when not if' with Katla for years though. When Ejafjallajokull erupted there were scientists talking about Katla as if an eruption was imminent - but that's the whole thing with volcanoes - they can rumble away and erupt, or they can rumble a bit and then settle down again for years, even decades. Volcanoes are, by nature, unpredictable. I love a good eruption, but there is never any certainty. And Katla is a big bastard and will cause untold disruption when it blows, so I rather hope it stays slumbering!

[sentia]

It's also "when" not "if" the San Andreas fault will go off and take out most of the US west coast. My understanding of seismic timeframe estimates is that they are accurate to within hundreds / thousands of years though... But hopefully someone more knowledgeable turns up because I'm curious too!

[MrSlant]

I think they had two big earthquakes there in the last 24/48 hours. I'm patient, I can watch people discuss not much happening with a volcano for ages. It's fascinating stuff. They do appear to have been saying an eruption is 'imminent' since 2011 though .

I like this article, hedging it's bets in every direction! Wired article.

[MrSlant]

The time frame of major eruptions there (since records began) appear to show an eruption occurring between 13-95 years apart. Although I don't think anything statistical can be gleaned from that it's been 98 years now.

[sentia]

I found this from the Icelandic Met office.

[FuzzyWizard]

There's an evacuation procedure for the 'towns' along that stretch of the south coast (like Vik) if Katla were to go, I seem to remember. They'll begin evacuating if an eruption really seems imminent due to the risk of catastrophic flash flooding from meltwater off the Myrdalsjokull (sp?) glacier.

[nemno]

Is it Volcano Cafe forum you meant OP?
www.volcanocafe.org/pluto-the-big-hearted-dwarf/comment-page-2/#comment-9372

I keep an eye on the drumplots hraun.vedur.is/ja/drumplot/mapDRUM.php
The one you want for Katla in the south is marked VI-God

And the web cam is

www.livefromiceland.is/webcams/katla/

[GloriaSmud]

Katla was always going to be the one to watch after Eyjafjallajokull went and it's been rumbling away ever since. They think there have been a couple of glacial eruptions under the ice in the last few years but that's been about it.
Two excellent websites are: Jón Frímann's blog (as of yesterday, he doesn't think there's been an eruption yet]] and Volcanocafe. (scroll down on both to get to the Katla bits.)

Also Katla's webcam (not a lot to be seen at the moment!)

[liamsdaddy]

This is a fairly good volcano site for analysis: www.jonfr.com/volcano/

Also there is Volcano Cafe.

[GloriaSmud]

The Icelandic Met Office (IMO) as of a few weeks ago, didn't think an eruption was imminent. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

[PseudoBadger]

The webcam is certainly shaking a lot - tremors or wind I wonder?

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Yes, I've been keeping an eye on her. Carl's latest blog post was a bit

[MrSlant]

Ah, I have found my people, and my links, again .

[MrSlant]

Love Volcano Cafe, the amazing brains that live in there make me so happy and Jon Frimann for his often slightly differing opinions

[VenusRising]

Obviously this is the North Atlantic ridge, but don't Ejafjallijokull and this one share a magma chamber and tend to go off in tandem? I hope it doesn't go off, as there is 10Km depth of ice ready to blast off the top of it... That's a lot of disruption.

In other parts if you're volcano watching, there have been lots of rumblings from Vesuvius as far as I know as well, and this recent seismic activity (last week and a few years ago) in might be related to that shift.

Thanks for the links.

[MumOnTheRunCatchingUp]

So for Iceland it would be a danger

Would it affect Uk? Scotland?

[VenusRising]

Well, there's no active volcanism in the U.K. (and Scotland is part of the U.K. still?) as it's not on any ridge or subduction zone, so no, an eruption on this active ridge be won't start anything off in the U.K.

However, we saw particulate matter thrown high up into the atmosphere with the last Icelandic volcanic eruption, and that grounded jet airplanes, so this one might have the same effect, if it shot up ash and dust. Remember the ash cloud, right?

[MrSlant]

For Iceland it could be terrible if it sets off one of those awful floods (jökulhlaups) washing away farms and infrastructure, although they have detailed evacuation plans in place so hopefully all the humans would be safe and away if it happened. The worst for us (I hope) could be limitations to flights if the ash is the right type.

I'm presuming that human habitation is well away from the volcano, I would hate to come across as being a voyeur of human tragedy. I am fascinated by the science behind the predictions of these events and the fact that no one can truly predict what will happen. All the charts and data on the Volcano Cafe page make me very happy.

[FuzzyWizard]

people in Iceland do live close to the volcanoes but the communities are relatively small. People could be killed and injured in an eruption and homes are at serious risk of being destroyed or badly damaged.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

I'm quite interested (in a scientific, not hopeful way!) of the temporary impact a large explosive eruption would have on climate in the northern hemisphere. There could potentially be a significant cooling effect for a few years.

[MrSlant]

I've just spent a while with my conscience as to how bad a person I am to be fascinated, well that and some time with the internet and what it's like living in Iceland/near to a volcano and I'm educated and still very interested! The authorities have a lot in place for the various scenarios that could happen. Is this why we have so much scientific information about tremors and all of these things?

Also fascinating to think that we humans (well most of us!) fret about climate change and what to do when one single volcano could make more impact than the lot of us put together.

I will watch with interest!

[SwedishEdith]

I'm glad this one is easier to pronounce.

[WhoKnowsWhereTheTimeG0es]

I went there in 1997, a year after Grimsvötn erupted under a glacier, you could see the path the floods had swept through the glacier and down to the coast from the patched up ring road, which had been swept away. Huge (100s of feet high) dirty lumps of ice that had been deposited on the flood plain, it was fascinating but very unnerving.