The Fagradalsfjall converted into a tourist attraction, is the longest on the island for 60 years
Probably the day is near when a volcanologist erupts like the Cumbre Vieja when some journalist asks him, for the umpteenth time, something to which, for the moment, it is impossible to answer precisely: How long is the eruption going to last on La Palma? ? Active since last Sunday, the Canarian giant still has a long way to go to emulate Fagradalsfjall, a volcano near Reykjavík that has been erupting for six months, the longest in Iceland since the 1960s. The unstoppable natural phenomenon has become an attractive tourist attraction attended by thousands of onlookers. On Canary Island, could something similar happen and continue talking about the course of the lava in March 2022?
Although she is cautious in her predictions, Teresa Ubide
, a professor at the University of Queensland (Brisbane, Australia), believes that the Cumbre Vieja won’t go that far. “The two volcanoes have a basaltic composition. This type of magma, with low silica content and high magnesium content, has low viscosity and generates effusive (called Hawaiian) to moderately explosive (strombolian) eruptions, as we see on La Palma », she explains.
Regarding its geological context, the mechanism of magma generation in the Earth’s mantle, under the crust, is not exactly the same. “While the Canary Islands have hotspot volcanism, Iceland is a special case where we have hotspot volcanism coinciding with a plate boundary, that of the Atlantic Ridge,” he says. That is the reason why Iceland is on the surface of the water, while the rest of the ridge generates submarine volcanism. These conditions make “the rate of magma supply in Iceland very high.”
According to the researcher, the key difference is in the past. ‘It is very important to understand the past behavior of a volcano – what he likes to call its ‘personality’ – in order to make predictions about how it may behave in the future. In this sense, taking into account the historical eruptions of La Palma, the current eruption will most likely last from weeks to a few months, less time than the Icelandic one.
Four years of eruption
The Fagradalsfjall eruption began six months ago with a fissure in the ground and has so far ejected nearly 143 million cubic meters of lava. However, this volume is considered relatively small, eleven times smaller than that of Holuhraun, which occurred between 2014 and 2015, and lasted less but launched the largest lava flow in 230 years on the island. But for real record Surtsey, near the south coast of Iceland, lasted almost four years, from November 1963 to June 1967.
Accompanied by a plume of smoke caused by the release of gases, the incandescent liquid occasionally rises from the Fagradalsfjall crater and also collects below ground, creating burning tunnels under layers of solidified lava. Although it may seem scary, the volcano has attracted thousands of people who take photos in front of the lava.
