Iceland's fiery show continued as a volcano in the southwest decided to do its thing once again, marking its fifth eruption since December. Picture this: a mountain ridge called Sundhnjukar gets cracked open like a walnut, and out comes lava shooting up to 150 feet high in a breathtaking display of nature's power.
Now, get this: just about two hours before the show started at 1 p.m., the weather guys gave a heads-up about a possible eruption. And boom! Civil defense got on their feet, sending out texts faster than you can say "evacuate" to the folks chilling at the Blue Lagoon. Imagine getting that text while soaking in those warm geothermal waters! But hey, safety first, right?
So, there go the sirens blaring out their warning, and folks start hustling out of there. Within minutes, social media lit up with pics of this two-mile-long crack in the earth. Smoke billowed up, visible even from Reykjavik, the big city.
Helga Arnadottir, the spokesperson, said this was like the fifth rodeo since the volcano woke up last year. Evacuations are getting routine now, she says. The folks at the hotels took about half an hour to clear out, not bad at all.
Meanwhile, Grindavik, a town that's taken a beating from previous eruptions, had to move another 300 souls out. The government's been offering to buy up all the homes there, seeing as it's not exactly prime real estate with all the lava and quakes wrecking the place. Almost everyone's taken them up on the offer.
Now, here's the kicker: the tourism folks are like, "Hey, don't go chasing volcanoes." They're worried about folks trying to get too close to the action. But they're quick to add, "Iceland's still cool, folks!" 'Cause, you know, the economy kinda lives and breathes on tourism here. And speaking of breath, flights at Keflavik Airport? Not a hiccup despite all this drama.
Scientists, being all sciency, had kinda seen this coming after the last eruption a few weeks back. Magnus Gudmundsson, one of the volcano experts, flew over the site and saw that crack getting wider. By evening, lava was knocking on Grindavik's door, ripping through barriers like they're nothing. Some parts of the road? Toast. The volcano's already spewed out 2.1 square miles of lava, which, according to Mr. Gudmundsson, is quite a bit.
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