January 14, 2024 05:48 pm | Updated 06:48 pm IST - LONDONA volcano has erupted in southwestern Iceland for the second time in less than a month, sending semi-molten rock spewing toward a nearby settlement. The eruption just before 8 a.m. Sunday came after a swarm of earthquakes near the town of Grindavik, the Icelandic Meteorological Office said. “Lava is flowing a few hundred meters north of the town, this is 400 to 500 meters," Kristín Jónsdóttir from the Icelandic Meteorological Office told Iceland’s RUV television. But the walls of the barriers built north of Grindavik have been breached and lava is on the move toward the community, the meteorological office said. Iceland, which sits above a volcanic hot spot in the North Atlantic, averages an eruption every four to five years.

Source: The Hindu January 15, 2024 01:29 UTC