Iceland volcano erupts for sixth time since December

A volcano in south-west Iceland has erupted for the sixth time since December, spewing lava through a new fissure on the Reykjanes peninsula.

Live video images showed orange lava bursting out of a long fissure, illuminating billowing smoke rising up into the night sky.

Unlike previous eruptions, the lava was not flowing towards the town of Grindavík, which was largely evacuated in December when the volcano came to life after being dormant for 800 years.

Benedikt Gunnar Ófeigsson, a geophysicist at the Icelandic Met Office, said that although it had started in the same region to the previous two eruptions and with similar intensity, this time the lava was heading north rather than the south.

“It stopped propagating around 5am this morning and since mid-morning we have seen the fissure start the process of contracting the eruption in isolated fissures,” he told the Guardian. “At the same time we see the change in eruption behaviour we observe reduction in deformation and in seismicity.”

This, he added, probably means that the eruption is stabilising.

“Currently no infrastructure is at risk of being run over by lava.”

The eruption took place on the Sundhnúkur crater row east of Sýlingarfell mountain, partly overlapping the other recent activity on the Reykjanes peninsula. The volcanic system has no central crater but opens giant cracks in the ground when it erupts.

The Meteorological Office said a fissure had opened east of Sýlingarfell at 9.29pm local time (22.29 BST) after a series of earthquakes. In an update at 10am local time on Friday, the office said the strength of the eruption had decreased since its peak, with activity largely confined to two fissures, but that it was yet to reach equilibrium.

Iceland’s national airport and air navigation service provider, Isavia, said flights to and from Iceland were operating normally. The department for civil protection and emergency management said that activity was “much further north than has been seen before”. Iceland remained a safe destination and all services were operating as usual, it said. The eruption’s effects were localised and “do not threaten people”.

The eruption had been anticipated for some time. The most recent activity on the Reykjanes peninsula, which is home to 30,000 people or nearly 8% of the country’s population, ended on 22 June after spewing fountains of molten rock for 24 days.

The eruptions show the challenge the country of nearly 400,000 people faces. Scientists say the geological system could be active for decades or even centuries. There have been nine eruptions on the peninsula since 2021 after 800 years of dormancy.

Related: ‘There’s a volcano in our backyard’: life in the Icelandic town that keeps erupting

In response, authorities have constructed barriers to redirect lava flows away from critical infrastructure, including the Svartsengi power plant, the Blue Lagoon outdoor spa and Grindavík .

The IMO had warned for weeks that another eruption was likely and said on Monday that seismic activity indicated a buildup of pressure and magma accumulation under the Svartsengi geothermal field, where the power plant is located.

The plant was evacuated and has largely been run remotely since the first eruption in December.

Iceland is home to 33 active volcano systems, the highest number in Europe. It straddles the Mid-Atlantic ridge, a crack in the ocean floor between the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates.

Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report