Iceland: "high" probability of eruption for the Grimsvötn volcano

Are we going to witness a scenario à la Eyjafjallajökull, the Icelandic volcano which blocked air traffic in 2010 after having erupted?

Iceland on Monday placed another volcano, the Grimsvötn, on "orange" alert after the detection of nearby earthquakes reaching up to 3.6 magnitude.

The alert level was raised to "orange" instead of "yellow" because of "high seismic activity", said on its website the Meteorological Office of Iceland (IMO).

Located in an uninhabited and inaccessible area in the center of the country, this volcano was already under surveillance due to a flood linked to the rupture of a glacial lake, likely to trigger an eruption. A brutal natural phenomenon known under the name of "jökulhlaup", this tumultuous flow of water which began ten days ago reached its maximum flow on Sunday morning. However, the drop in pressure on the volcano caused by the flow of millions of tons of water can trigger an eruption, as was the case in 2004, but also in 1934 and 1922.

Intended for aviation to signal the risk of eruption, the color code assigned to Grimsvötn means that this volcano, the most active in the country, "shows increased activity with a higher probability of eruption", according to the scale defined by the 'IMO. Code red indicates that an eruption is considered imminent with a likely significant emission of ash harmful to air traffic, or while a problematic eruption for aviation is in progress.

During its last eruption ten years ago, its ash cloud had caused small disruptions to air traffic, with around 900 canceled flights, however not in common with the Eyjafjallajökull (100,000 canceled flights and ten million passengers stranded) in 2010. Located under Iceland's largest glacier named Vatnajökull, Grimsvötn erupts approximately every five to 10 years.

The last one happened in 2011.