Grindavik, Iceland — A volcano of Iceland It erupted Saturday afternoon for the fourth time in three months, spewing jets of orange lava into the night sky.
The Iceland Meteorological Office indicated that the eruption opened a fissure in the earth about almost 2 miles long between the mountains Stóra-Skógfell and Hagafell, on the Reykjanes Peninsula.
The Met Office warned for weeks that magma, which is semi-molten rock, was building up underground, making an eruption likely.
When the eruption began, hundreds of people were evacuated from the Blue Lagoon hot springs resort, one of Iceland's main tourist attractions, according to the national broadcaster RUV.
No flight disruptions were reported at nearby Keflavik airport, which is Iceland's main airport.
The eruption site is a few miles northeast of Grindavik, a coastal town of 3,800 about 30 miles southwest of Iceland's capital, Reykjavik. which was evacuated before the initial eruption in December. Some residents who had returned to their homes were evacuated again on Saturday.
In Iceland, which sits in a volcanic area of the North Atlantic, eruptions occur periodically, and the country has a lot of experience in dealing with them. The one that has caused the most disruption in recent times was that of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano, which occurred in 2010, which released large clouds of ash into the atmosphere and caused widespread closures of airspace throughout Europe.
No deaths have been confirmed from any of the recent eruptions, but one worker was reported missing after falling into a fissure opened by the volcano.