National Geographic News has an article today about the submarine volcano recently discovered off the south-west of Iceland by University of Iceland volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson:

The structure turned out to be an active volcano that rises about 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) above the surrounding sections of the ridge, coming within 1,300 feet (400 meters) of the surface. At its base the volcano is approximately 30 miles (50 kilometers) across. The peak contains a depression known as a caldera that is 6 miles (10 kilometers) wide.

The size of the edifice, says Höskuldsson, indicates that it is being fed by its own magma chamber. Next year he and his team are planning to use a submarine to explore the volcano, hoping to clarify the anomaly of why it has developed in a region where tectonic plates pulling apart normally prevent the growth of such large volcanic structures.

Information
Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program - volcanoes of Iceland and the Arctic Ocean
Volcanoes in Iceland - University of Iceland Institute of Earth Sciences

News
Giant undersea volcano found off Iceland - National Geographic News, 22 April 2008

English-language Icelandic news website Iceland Review Online has another report on the large submarine volcano identified by Ármann Höskuldsson off the Reykjanes peninsula in southwest Iceland, written in what’s perhaps best described as an informal, lively style:

Bubbling hot underneath 1,500 meters of water, a volcanic caldera (the lava spitting mouth of a volcano) measuring 10 kilometers in diameter simmers sinisterly. Scratching their heads, a group of Icelandic scientists wonder how it got there in the first place.

Taking a few minutes off from scratching his head, Höskuldsson warns that ‘People shouldn’t be surprised if there would be an extensive volcanic eruption underwater there soon. Nothing has happened for hundreds of years and it is in fact only a matter of time before there will be an eruption’.

Information
Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program - volcanoes of Iceland and the Arctic Ocean
Volcanoes in Iceland - University of Iceland Institute of Earth Sciences

News
A volcanic surprise - Iceland Review Online, 12 April 2008

Iceland Review Online reports today that a large submarine volcano has been found off the Reykjanes peninsula in southwest Iceland.

Volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson from the University of Iceland and a team of scientists recently discovered a more than 50-square-kilometer volcano off Reykjanes peninsula, southwest Iceland, and expect it to erupt at any time. In the center of the volcano there is a caldera measuring ten kilometers in diameter.

The presence of such a large caldera volcano in an area of ocean ridge volcanism is ‘a surprise’. The volcano reported here is presumably part of the Reykjaneshryggur submarine volcanic system, although the article doesn’t say so.

Höskuldsson and his team will be presenting a paper on their discovery at the IAVCEI 2008 general assembly to be held in Reykjavík in August.

Information
Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program - volcanoes of Iceland and the Arctic Ocean
Volcanoes in Iceland - University of Iceland Institute of Earth Sciences

News
Giant underwater volcano discovered in Iceland - Iceland Review Online, 8 April 2008

Some interesting recent open-access articles of volcanological interest: National Geographic Magazine looks at the place of volcanoes in Indonesian culture, The Economist explores the climate effects of the Laki eruption of 1783, and Geology.com has an account of the 1912 Novarupta eruption.

Volcano Culture - National Geographic Magazine (January 2008)
‘On a less earthly plane, volcanoes stand at the heart of a complicated set of mystical beliefs that grip millions of Indonesians and influence events in unexpected ways. Their peaks attract holy men and pilgrims. Their eruptions augur political change and social upheaval. You might say that in Indonesia, volcanoes are a cultural cauldron in which mysticism, modern life, Islam, and other religions mix—or don’t. Indonesia, an assemblage of races, religions, and tongues, is riveted together by volcanoes. Reverence for them is virtually a national trait.’ Read on >>

18th-century climate change: the summer of acid rain - The Economist (19 December 2007)
‘In Europe, the summer of 1783 had been unusually warm, the warmest recorded in England before 1995. White called the season “an amazing and portentous one, full of horrible phenomena”, and complained of the abnormal number of wasps. The heat may have been a short-term greenhouse-gas effect from high concentrations of sulphur dioxide. … At the time, some people suspected the volcano might be to blame. Benjamin Franklin, then America’s ambassador to Paris, wrote to the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester that “[the sun's] effect of heating the Earth was exceedingly diminished. Hence the surface was early frozen. Hence the first snows remained on it unmelted. Hence the air was more chilled. Hence perhaps the winter of 1783-84 was more severe than any that had happened for many years.” In speculating upon the cause, he wondered “whether it was the vast quantity of smoke, long continuing to issue during the summer from Hecla in Iceland [near Laki]“. It was.’ Read on >>

The most powerful volcanic eruption of the twentieth century - Geology.com (12 December 2007)
‘On June 6th, 1912 a tremendous blast sent a large cloud of ash skyward and the eruption of the century was underway. People in Juneau, Alaska, about 750 miles from the volcano, heard the sound of the blast – over one hour after it occurred. For the next 60 hours the eruption sent tall dark columns of tephra and gas high into the atmosphere. By the time the eruption ended the surrounding land was devastated and about 30 cubic kilometers of ejecta blanketed the entire region. This is more ejecta than all of the other historic Alaska eruptions combined. It was also thirty times more than the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens and three times more than the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo, the second largest in the 20th Century.’ Read on >>