Talk:2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Apples and oranges

In the section on the most recent eruption it reads as follows: "The seismic activity continued to increase and from March 3 to 5, close to 30 earthquakes were measured at the epicentre in the volcano. Most were too small (magnitude 2 on Richter scale) to be read as presaging an eruption, but some could be detected in nearby towns." The last sentence appears a bit confused with the first clause relating to signs of an eruption measured by the measured magnitude of the quakes, however, I find it hard to believe that people in nearby towns noticing the tremors is one of the telltale signs used by scientists to predict an imminent eruption. __meco (talk) 14:48, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

infobox

What infobox should be used on this article? Not the glacier one on the parent article... is it the mountain infobox? (I wonder what is used for volcanoes that are not mountains... since Iceland has those as well...)

70.29.208.247 (talk) 12:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Maps

Locator map, ash distribution map, flooding maps would be useful. 70.29.208.247 (talk) 12:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Indications of time (UT v GMT)

In most contexts, GMT is deprecated in favour of UT. None of the countries involved in the airspace closures are on GMT (including UK). Around the rest of the world, readers' local time [certainly as given in all the national articles, widely otherwise] are given as UT ± n hours, which help them to convert the times in the article to local time. I propose to change all usages of GMT to UT tomorrow unless anyone has a considered objection. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:05, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

You mean Universal Time ? --93.82.3.65 (talk) 21:15, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Or UTC (Coordinated Universal Time)? --Red King (talk) 22:27, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Even better, for Icelandic events, hh:mm UTC+0. Then ATC restrictions are hh:mm UCT+1 for UK and Ireland, hh:mm UTC+2 for Norway and so on.

NASA Images

Here is a website that has imagery of the event.

[1]

We should be able to load these images into Commons under

This file is in the public domain because it was created by NASA. NASA copyright policy states that "NASA material is not protected by copyright unless noted". (NASA copyright policy page or JPL Image Use Policy)

Warnings:

Use of NASA logos, insignia and emblems is restricted per US law 14 CFR 1221.
The NASA website hosts a large number of images from the Soviet/Russian space agency, and other non-American space agencies. These are not in the public domain.
Materials from the Hubble Space Telescope may be copyrighted if they do not explicitly come from the STScI. [2]
All materials created by the SOHO probe are copyrighted and require permission for commercial non-educational use. [3]
Images featured on the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) web site may be copyrighted. [4]

and then use them here. I've tried and failed at using commons properly, so I'll leave it for someone that knows what they are doing to load them up.Aalox (talk) 16:55, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Also this (or larger version) seems to be a NASA image... Evercat (talk) 17:14, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Travel plans of celebrities???

I'd suggest that the entire paragraph on people whose travel plans were disrupted should be dropped - they hardly justify mention in a newspaper, let alone an encyclopaedia which isn't going to be thrown away tomorrow. Pol098 (talk) 16:58, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Support. If the event delayed some event that has it's own article, like 2012 Summer Olympics, that might warrent a small note with a wiki-link. Otherwise I agree it should be dropped. --Aalox (talk) 17:33, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I think we should keep this along with other consequences of the air traffic shutdown, for instance, the Norwegian prime minister who is stranded in New York. __meco (talk) 17:50, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Polo098. 129.120.94.104 (talk) 20:27, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Need a native Icelandic speaker?

If you're improving this article and don't speak Icelandic, but need something translated and Google Translate doesn't work: E-mail me at avarab@gmail.com or reply here. I'm sure others would be willing to help as well. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 18:37, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Is this redundant?

"Farmers in nearby locations have been warned not to let their livestock drink from local ponds and streams as high concentrations of fluoride can have deadly renal and hepatic effects in livestock (particularly sheep)., but agriculture remains important in this region of Iceland." The last clause, about agriculture being important is related to the previous sentence, but it reads as a non-sequitur. Should it simply be removed? __meco (talk) 15:37, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it lends to the implications of letting farm animals drink the water. Orgennoon (talk) 10:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Airports closed in Germany

Currently these are closed: Hamburg, Bremen, Hannover, Münster-Osnabrück, Düsseldorf, Berlin, Cologne and Frankfurt, the biggest airport. Airport Hahn is gonna be closed during the morning. When Stuttgart and Munich gonna be closed is not clear by now. http://www.stern.de/reise/service/aschewolke-ueber-europa-immer-mehr-deutsche-flughaefen-dicht-1558917.html# SkySilver (talk) 05:36, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

In Germany are 15 of the 16 international Airports closed. Only Munich is still open, but limited. SkySilver (talk) 12:11, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Timeline table

We should have a timeline table to outline the developing closing of airspaces. __meco (talk) 05:57, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, but I think a further article split should be made dedicated to the air travel disruption which in itself is notable and unprecendented. This would keep this article dedicated to the eruption itself. How about Air travel disruption after the Eyjafjallajökull eruption. I don't think it needs a 2010 date just yet unless it happens every year from now on, in which case the article could be renamed.ChrisUK (talk) 11:36, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree with that idea. The air travel disruptions would tend to upstage the volcanic eruption. __meco (talk) 15:40, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Done ChrisUK (talk) 16:35, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Estimated ash cloud

I think the graphic with the estimated ash cloud should be removed, if it's supossed to be current. I live in the area where the ash cloud should be at 18:00 GMT and the sky was almost 100% clear at 18:00 GMT, means 20:00 here. SkySilver (talk) 20:23, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

the particles are at 6 miles over ground. Not a cloud, but a massive amount of tiny particles that are also dangerous. That's why it is not visible--DAI (Δ) 20:28, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Ah ok, already thought something like that, but wanted to ask someone, who really knows. But is it possible that I can see the "cloud" of the particles lighted by the sun in the night? This confuses me: http://www.sat24.com/Eyjafjallajokull-volcano.aspx SkySilver (talk) 20:33, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

That's very unlikely. During the 1998 Grímsvötn eruption I placed a white cloth outside near Akureyri which is just a few hundred kilometers away. After a few hours not more than ~100 or so little particles of fallout were visible.

There isn't going to be some giant black cloud over central Europe unless this eruption becomes a lot more powerful. That might happen if Katla erupts but as-is the "cloud" is really just a bunch of invisible particles dense enough to cause trouble for air travel. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 23:10, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

You can see the ash particles at sunset and sunrise. They will appear as coloring the sky "red". Red sunsets and sunrises are the result of volcanic ash in the sky. When Krakatoa exploded, the sky turned red as far as Poughkeepsie, NY, USA, so red that fire companies were called out looking for the fires. I don't know the original source for this information. It is documented in "Krakatoa: The Day The World Exploded", but I've seen it in other earlier texts. Now the colors may vary, I've seen oranges and purples also as a result of volcanic ash. It varies based on the ash composition.--Celtic hackr (talk) 14:57, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

a question

How long exactly does this ash cloud last? And will it still affect Ireland despite the fact there's an anti-cyclone hovering over Ireland? 188.141.18.50 (talk) 23:02, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

It depends completely on how long the eruption lasts, and the dominant jet stream patterns during that eruption. Some anti-cyclones reach all the way to the upper atmosphere, but not all. Surface weather will probably change much more rapidly than the scale/duration of this eruption. (The ash will probably increase and last even longer if Katla erupts as well. Start thinking in terms of months, if not a year.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.112.29.134 (talk) 03:33, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Potential health hazard

Formation of cristobalite nanofibers during explosive volcanic eruptions http://geology.gsapubs.org/content/37/5/435.abstract High-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) observations of unaltered volcanic air-fall deposits from the ongoing lava dome explosive eruption at Chaitén Volcano, Chilean Patagonia, revealed the presence of highly crystalline silica nanofibers in the respirable fraction of the volcanic ash (<4 μm). The nanofibers are identified as the high-temperature (>240 °C), beta form of cristobalite, with average lengths of hundreds of nanometers and widths on the order of tens of nanometers. We propose that the beta-cristobalite nanofibers are formed during explosive eruptions by the reduction of amorphous silica by carbon monoxide to its reactive suboxide SiO, which is later oxidized to form one-dimensional crystalline silica nanostructures. Nucleation and growth of the nanofibers are enhanced by the high surface area of the micrometer- to nanometer-sized fragments of silica glass in the volcanic column. The formation of nanocrystalline cristobalite fibers during explosive lava dome eruptions poses new challenges for the assessment of the short- and long-term health hazards associated with the respirable nanofibrous components of volcanic ash. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.236.147.203 (talk) 16:38, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Lost reference?

"As the largest air traffic shut-down since [[World War II]],<ref name="SMH2" />" — There is no SMH2 reference as of the edit prior to mine; if orphaned, I'm surprised a bot hasn't found it yet. I've tagged it {{cn}} for now. – Kerαunoςcopia^◁_galaxies 08:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I have added the reference. Best regards, Hayden120 (talk) 08:53, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

start of eruption

I'm not a volcano expert and I would have thought the start of an eruption was when the ash or whatever became visible. So I don't know what this means: "The eruption is thought to have begun on 20 March 2010,". An explanation would help. 4.249.63.213 (talk) 15:04, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

It's under a glacier and sometimes you don't know when such eruptions begin. Some eruptions begin with violent earthquakes, others just begin when magma starts bubbling out of the ground. When that ground is under an ice cap the start time is unknown. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:13, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

New NASA imagery

Here's some really impressive NASA imagery:

Are these the highest resolution images available from NASA or is this just their flickr export? It would be great to get these in the article in high-res format. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:17, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I uploaded these to commons. -Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 15:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

... and they're now in the article. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 16:00, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Image text for picture of people observing first eruption

The text was incorrectly changed : 21:05, 18 April 2010 David spector (talk | contribs) (28,706 bytes) (→First eruption: Photo seems to be of a different volcano)

The picture is indeed taken of people observing the first fissue, i took it myself being around 500 meters away from the flying lava. It is placed in the correct section of the article, "first fissue", and this is how it looked at that time, before the second fissue and the major eruption of the volcano. The pictures geotagging and timestamping is correct.

The text should be changed from "People observing a volcano in Iceland" to "People observing the first fissue at Fimmvörðuháls" __boaworm (talk) 00:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Done --220.101.28.25 (talk) 03:30, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Update first image to higher quality version

The first/top image of this article contains significant digital distortion and jpeg artifacts when viewed in full resolution. It should be replaced with image "Eyjafjallajokull volcano plume 2010 04 18.JPG". This image has an almost identical framing, but with significantly less artifacts and distortions. Alternatively it could be replaced with "Eyjafjallajokull_volcano_from_Hella_2010_04_18.JPG" which include the village of Hella in the foreground as well, providing the viewer with a second dimension, the presence of this eruption to peoples day to day lives.

__boaworm (talk) 00:41, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Done Blurpeace 08:17, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

VEI 2nd Eruption

Anybody know the VEI of the April 14th 2nd eruption ? 110.54.179.72 (talk) 15:13, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

economic effects

Aside from travel, these should be added and expanded. Icelandic farmers are having to put their cows back in the barn. This means instead of letting them graze outside, the farmers will have to spend money on hay -- at this time of the year what they put in the barn for winter is almost gone -- and on getting it transported. Also at this season of the year hay-cutting hasn't started in Europe and when it does will the hay be contaminated by the fluorine? That would mean even higher expenses bringing the hay from farther away.It's going to be an added expense; can they remain profitable?

- At one point this link had text about Italian farmers who provide milk for mozzarella di bufa, bison cheese. This cheese is the only product using the milk, it's too rich to just drink. It goes bad quickly so the farmers may have to pour profits on the ground because they can't ship the milk or cheese. The online article has been rewritten, the info is no longer there, and Google didn't turn up any other links on this. http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=111&sid=1934837 4.249.63.213 (talk) 15:25, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Kenya's fresh vegetable and flower industry is suffering, losing $3 million a day on top of the $12 million destroyed up to April 19 because air transport to Europe was halted. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/2010/0419/How-the-Iceland-volcano-ash-cloud-is-crippling-Kenya-s-flower-industry

Jet fuel use down 2 million barrels per day

Just in time operations disrupted http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/international/2010/04/19/109110.htm 4.249.15.61 (talk) 23:53, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree that economic effects should be added, but just not here which is about the eruption itself. The correct place to put this text is Aftermath of the 2010 Eyjafjallajökull eruption ChrisUK (talk) 14:26, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

New eruption today?

Why aren't we detailing the major new ash cloud coming in? Looks like old Eyjafjallajökull isn't done dumping on EMEA. Eyjafjallajökull ka-boom (talk) 22:40, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

'EMEA' please explain? Is that Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (Very topical username by the way!) --220.101.28.25 (talk) 14:41, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

volcanic ash maps

Perhaps we could build a gallery showing the progression of the ash cloud, like here? http://ca.wiki.x.io/wiki/Erupcions_de_l%27Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull_del_2010#N.C3.BAvol_de_cendra Cogiati (talk) 16:27, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Polish aircrash memoria

The news is reporting that the Polish memorial for the aircrash may be poorly attended by international VIPs because of the Icelandic eruption's dust disruption for air travel...

70.29.208.247 (talk) 07:09, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I was expecting that to hit the media sometime yesterday. They are slow. Still, only northern Polish airspace is closed. Outside Europe, transatlantic is not the only direction in a round world; and southern travel has not yet been disrupted. (So they won't do the great circle route between Washington DC and northern Europe. Won't make that much difference against how much they travel anyway.) Within Europe, other forms of travel (trains, low-flying aircraft) should still be able to bring dignitaries, should they wish to come. You will notice the RAF has not been grounded. Still another option is to land with the larger airplane at points south or east, and then helicopter in. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.112.29.149 (talk) 13:35, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

By "Southern travel" do you mean Southern Hemisphere ie Australia? Travel here is very much affected. No planes going to/from England, and many people travel between England and Australia. Many trapped in Australian for a minimum of a few days. Many similarly trapped in England for a few days. When it clears many aircraft will likely be out of place for ferrying passengers. I think it is very possible that well known(smaller) airlines will go out of business because of this. Re. RAF, military fly under rather different rules than commercial aircraft! I wonder if any propellor driven planes ie Fokker Friendship are still able to fly in these conditions?--220.101.28.25 (talk) 15:53, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I meant "southern" via Madrid, Lisbon, and the Mediterranean. I do believe Angela Merkel came home that way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.254.157.120 (talk) 02:35, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you that clears it up. Could you please sign you posts, though, type four 'tildes' ~~~~, or use the 'signature' button (next to the red 'No W' button at top of the editing window). nb. I have added a few indents to your post keep the comment order clear. Regards, --220.101.28.25 (talk) 11:05, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Not quite Fokker Friendship-sized, but I have seen a few light aircraft flying today across Kent (SE England), as they are a) prop-driven and b) flying below controlled airspace. Regards, Lynbarn (talk) 16:43, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Lynbarn. Interesting, though now the airlines are whinging that it was overly cautious/ unecessary to close the aispace, or for so long. --220.101.28.25 (talk) 11:25, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Unintelligible reference

As reference for the witnessing for the first time in history the creation of a pseudocrater is this text: Kvöldfréttir Stöðvar Tvö "Viðtal við Ármann Höskuldsson eldfjallafræðing" Fréttastofa Stöðvar Tvö. Can someone present this so that it can be understood and checked? __meco (talk) 20:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

It means "In the evening news of Stöð 2: An interview with the volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson". Is that what you were asking? --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 00:43, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

If you look at what is currently reference #24 in the article you will see this text. In its present shape nobody except Icelandic speakers are going to understand it. I hope someone (perhaps you?) could format it properly. __meco (talk) 05:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Well I've translated it :) I have no idea what the right cite template for something like this is, though. --Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 09:13, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Copyvio removed

Volume of erupted material and magma discharge for the first 72 hours (April 14–16, 2010) The Institute of Earth Sciences has now made a preliminary estimate of erupted material in the first three days of the eruption at Eyjafjallajökull. The erupted products are fragmented material, the majority fine-grained airborne tephra. Eruptive products can be split into three categories:

Material (tephra) in the ice cauldrons around the volcanic vents.

Tephra filling the glacial lagoon of Gígjökulslón, carried by floods down the outlet glacier Gígjökull.

Airborne tephra that has been carried to the east and south of the volcano.

The preliminary results are as follows:

Tephra in ice cauldrons 30 Million m³

Tephra in Gígjökull lagoon 10 Million m³

Tephra fallout from eruption plume 100 Million m³

Total: 140 Million m³

The tephra is uncompacted, these values corresponds to some 70-80 Million m3 of magma. The average magma discharge rate is about 300 m3/s or 750 tonnes/s.
This is 10-20 times the average discharge rate in the preceding flank eruption at Fimmvörðuháls.<ref>http://www.evropusamvinna.is/page/ies_Eyjafjallajokull_eruption</ref>

The above text has been lifted off from the url which is included. I suppose this is relevant for the article, but it will have to be incorporated in a more studious fashion than simply copying and pasting. __meco (talk) 12:13, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

See I have copied the information from the Institute of Earth Sciences report with minor amendments. Interesting if we compare the discharge rate of 300m3/s with other historic volcanos like Mount St. Helens (1980–present): 0.5 m³/s (Does that mean Eyjafjallajökull is 600 times more powerful than Mount St. Helens eruption. I guess we need an expert comments on that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nasser z (talk • contribs) 13:07, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Concurrent Worldwide Volcanic Activity

I've deleted this section as being of no relevance to the current earthquake – interesting, yes, but not relevant – and it has now been reinstated. On my talk page the section creator (Nasser z) writes "Please note that I couldn't find any wikipedia article that lists current active volcanos and I don't want to create a new article for that since it needs constant updating. I believe that the list is highly relevant to eruption article, since many are wondering if the icelandic eruption was in any way unique or rare phenomena. thus i'm undoing your deletion and we can discuss it in the discussion page if you still believe the deleted section irrelevant."
My view is if the reporting of every event had to contain a list of concurrent similar events in the world we'd never get anywhere. What do people think? Does this section belong in this (or another) article? Ericoides (talk) 12:30, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I have also left 'Nasser z' a message. I suggested paring his edit down and adding relevant parts to the existing "Comparison to other recent eruptions" section. It's good he wants to discuss it. Perhaps our fellow editor may find Lists of volcanoes useful?, though this includes active and extinct volcanoes. --220.101.28.25 (talk) 13:19, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Ericoides for your comments. I also received another comment from another user agreeing with you. You maybe right, but what i wanted to show, that there are other concurrent volcanic eruptions that put air traffic routes under control for other areas in the world. The aviation color code for the three currently active volcanos in Russia is Orange (meaning Volcano is exhibiting heightened or escalating unrest with increased potential of eruption, timeframe uncertain, or eruption is underway with no or minor volcanic-ash emissions. What was unique about this eruption is the altitude of the ash plumes going above 10 km (basically the airplanes flying zone). It is unclear to me if volume of ash ejected is exceeding historical eruptions (please see my note above regarding comparison with Mount St. Helens eruption) and other concurrent eruptions. Also effects on global temperature have a relation with the total volume of volcanic ash ejected into the atmosphere during the same period, taking into consideration that last year was remarkably colder than average across the northern hemisphere. I still think it is interesting to have such data available at Wikipedia either through this article or through a separate article. Nasser z (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 13:31, 21 April 2010 (UTC).

I deleted the (concurrent Worldwide Volcanic Activity) section and moved updated data to "comparison to other recent eruptions section". Nasser z (talk) 14:05, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

duplicate photos

The second and third photos in the article are the same photo with different names. One should be eliminated. Bubba73 ^{(You talkin' to me?)}, 18:40, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Done. Ericoides (talk) 20:07, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

This got terribly messed up. User LobStoR managed to overwrite the NASA Satellite image http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/File:Hot_spots_on_Iceland%E2%80%99s_Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull_Volcano.jpg with a modified version of my image http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fimmvordauhals_volcano_eruption_2010_03_27.jpg, clearly seen by looking at the image history of the former file. So these were two different photos, both serving a good purpose, and they should be restored. boaworm 11:29, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

I've restored the article, and as soon as the wikimedia image gets corrected it could be added to the article as well. Boaworm (talk) 11:49, 22 April 2010 (UTC) 11:48, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

pics with lightning

Can someone upload pics with the lightning during the eruption? That is the oddest thing I've ever seen. --Chris (クリス • フィッチュ) (talk) 15:45, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

There's one right here.[5] —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aang94479 (talk • contribs) 21:28, 23 April 2010 (UTC)