Manufacturology

Beautiful pictures from Eyjafjallajökull volcano

The vol­canic erup­tion on Ice­land is caus­ing seri­ous trou­ble, both for indi­vid­u­als and for soci­ety at large. Still, there is some­thing deeply fas­ci­nat­ing about the enor­mous pow­ers that are let loose when a vol­cano erupts.

The cur­rent erup­tion at Eyjaf­jal­la­jökull started on March 20 at Fim­mvörðuháls, which is located between Eyjaf­jal­la­jökull and Mýrdal­sjökull. The ice cap of Mýrdal­sjökull cov­ers the much big­ger vol­cano Katla, which his­tor­i­cally has fol­lowed with an erup­tion every time that the Eyjaf­jal­la­jökull vol­cano has erupted.

Below are some beau­ti­ful pic­tures taken by pho­tog­ra­phers vis­it­ing the site of the first eruption.

Heat–haze above lava flow at Eyjaf­jal­la­jökull on 28 March 2010. Click to enlarge. (Bruce McAdam/CC BY-SA)

Tourists at the vol­cano on 28 March 2010. Click to enlarge. (Bruce McAdam/CC BY-SA)

Ice­landic pho­tog­ra­pher Örvar Atli Þorgeirs­son wit­nessed how mas­sive amounts of steam was gen­er­ated, writ­ing that:

The lava from the erup­tion flows into two steep and deep canyons, Hrunagil and Hvan­nárgil. Here lava is flow­ing into the longer Hvan­nárgil just an hour after it going down the canyon.
The upper part of the canyon was filled with deep snow and ice. When the 1000°C hot lava mass and the snow/ice come into con­tact huge clouds of steam are formed. Occa­sional explo­sions also occur as steam gets trapped under hard­ened lava.

His amaz­ing photo of the event is seen below.

Steam is gen­er­ated when lava meets ice and snow on March 31 2010. Click to enlarge. (Örvar Atli Þorgeirs­son/CC BY-NC-ND)

Erup­tion at Fim­mvörðuháls on April 3 2010. Click to enlarge. (Ulrich Latzen­hofer/CC BY-SA)

Sev­eral other great pho­tos are found here.

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