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Vestmannaeyjar volcano Iceland
An ash-laden eruption column rises above a volcanic cone behind the town of Vestmannaeyjar on the island of Heimaey in 1973.
The pumping operation in the foreground was designed to cool the front of an advancing lava flow that threatened the town and its harbor.
Twenty-two postglacial eruption sites are known in the mostly submarine Vestmannaeyjar volcanic system, which occupies a shallow shelf off the southern coast of Iceland.
It contains the renowned island of Surtsey, which grew from the sea floor in an eruption that began in 1963.
The mostly submarine Vestmannaeyjar volcanic system is the southernmost and youngest volcanic center of the eastern volcanic zone that cuts across east-central Iceland.
It consists of a roughly 30 x 40 km group of basaltic volcanic islands and submarine cones occupying a shallow shelf off the south coast of Iceland.
Vestmannaeyjar was the site of two of Iceland's most noted 20th-century eruptions.
The new island of Surtsey grew from the ocean floor during 1963-67. The island of Heimaey, 20 km to the NE, was the site of dramatic eruptions in 1973 during which lava flows partially overran the town of Vestmannaeyjar and threatened its harbor.
Several other volcanoes have erupted during historical time.
Twenty-two postglacial eruption sites are known in the Vestmannaeyjar system, and all ten subaerial vents on Heimaey are of Holocene age.
PHOTO SOURCE: Photo by Jack Lockwood, 1973 (U.S. Geological Survey). courtesy of the Global Volcanism Program, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, used with permission.
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