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Fimmvörðuháls and Eyjafjallajökull, Iceland

If everything goes to plan I’ll be in Iceland next week to attend the Nordic Geological Winter Meeting. After the meeting I expect to join a short field trip to the Eyjafjallajökull. I hope to tell you more about that in about two weeks time. In the meantime just a bit about the names.

I suppose you all remember the volcanic eruptions last year at Eyjafjallajökull. As I mentioned in my post on Katla Next Icelandic Volcano to Blow? the eruption end March 2010 actually started at the Fimmvörduháls Pass between the Eyjafjallajökull ice field to the west (left) and the Mýrdalsjökull ice field to the east (right).

To my mind it would therefore have been more appropriate to talk about the Fimmvörðuháls eruption instead of Eyjafjallajökull. It has also been proposed to rename the new volcano to “Kreppa”, an Icelandic girl’s name, “Katla” the name of the nearby Katla volcano also being a girl’s name.

The name Fimmvörðuháls means five cairns hills (fimm = five, varða, in plural vörður = cairn (pile of stone to mark a summit), háls = pass (literally neck or throat)). For the meaning of Eyjafjallajökull and Mýrdalsjökull see my Katla post.

Stratigraphy.net | Impressum

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