Reykjavík Grapevine - 21.05.2010, Síða 12

With the current eruption at Eyjafjallajökull
rumbling on relatively steadily, produc-
ing an ash cloud that continues to wreak
havoc with European air traffic, I thought it
may be interesting to take a look at some
other potential troublemakers living on this
island. After all, Iceland is a land formed
almost entirely by volcanic processes, and
there is on average an eruption every 3 to
4 years—there's hardly a shortage of poten-
tially active volcanoes.
Trusty ol’ Hekla
First in our line-up is Hekla, the infamous
Icelandic 'gateway to Hell'. Beautifully coni-
cal from one side and similar in appear-
ance to an upturned boat from the other,
with a penchant for producing spectacular
fire fountaining fissure eruptions, Hekla
is a magnificent looking mountain. But it
has produced some quite large explosive
eruptions—in particular 1104 AD, and more
recently a smaller but no less spectacular
eruption in 1947.
Since 1970, Hekla seems to have settled
into a pattern—quite an oddity in volcanolo-
gy, a science where nothing is ever predict-
able—and has produced a relatively small
eruption almost exactly every 10 years. The
last of those was in 2000. On its own, this
would be less than convincing, but mea-
surements show that pressure within the
mountain is currently higher than prior to
the 2000 or 1991 eruptions. You could re-
ally consider Hekla primed to blow. It's also
an odd beast because it produces no real
earthquake activity until immediately (an
hour or so) prior to an eruption, so when
we see the ground shaking here, we know
something is up.
Grímsvötn builds pressure
Our next suspect is Grímsvötn, a well-
hidden volcano whose favourite tool of
destruction is the jökulhlaup (glacial out-
burst flood). Buried below the enormous
Vatnajökull ice cap, Grímsvötn is unlikely
to mess with air traffic any time soon be-
cause all that ice will probably stop much
ash from escaping very far, but such sub-
glacial eruptions have a history of aggres-
sion against bridges and other structures.
Grímsvötn's crater contains a lake lying
beneath the ice, made of water melted by
natural geothermal heat. Unlike most vol-
canoes, which may produce a jökulhlaup
due to ice melting during the eruption, it's
thought that this lake can naturally over-
flow, and this release of pressure can trig-
ger an eruption. Whether the jökulhlaup
comes before or after the eruption, though,
they can often be pretty damn big. And
right now? Well, as with Hekla the internal
pressure is pretty much at pre-eruption
levels, and the sub-glacial lake is also ap-
proaching its maximum height. You might
only see an eruption here on the news, due
to its remote location, but it should still be
quite a spectacle.
Biblical Katla
Our last volcano of interest is the one ev-
eryone seems so worried about at the
moment —the legendary Keyser Söze of
Icelandic mountains, Katla. Katla sits right
next to Eyjafjallajökull, is much bigger, and
history shows that it probably has some
kind of linkage to its neighbour—the last
three times Eyjafjallajökull erupted, Katla
followed suit within a couple of years. With
a general historical trend of 1–2 eruptions
per century, and the last confirmed (and
quite sizeable) eruption in 1918, you could
argue that we're 'overdue' a Katla eruption.
The volcano itself is capable of producing
all sorts of dangers. The enormous 934 AD
Eldgjá fissure eruption originated from the
Katla volcanic system, and the 1918 erup-
tion produced both an enormous eruption
plume (which in today's world could have
a major impact on air traffic) and an un-
imaginably huge jökulhlaup, which washed
icebergs the size of houses down onto the
plains below.
So what's the current state of affairs?
Who's the prime suspect for our next volca-
nic crime? Frankly, I think it's unlikely to be
Katla. I don't think anyone is denying that
Katla needs to be kept under close watch,
but right now it's showing little sign of stir-
ring as a result of the Eyjafjallajökull erup-
tion. Hekla and Grímsvötn, on the other
hand, are both showing signs of more or
less being 'ready' to go. Chances are that
neither of them is going to be particularly
dangerous (unless you're right on top of
them!), but my money says that one of them
will be our next guilty party...
By one swift, decisive act, it has para-
lyzed Europe’s airline industries for
almost a week, delayed 64 thousand
flights (and counting), affecting mil-
lions of travellers, reminding a whole
continent that geography and distance
still exist, while lessening the airlines’
carbon footprint by an amount equal
to the annual output of several smaller
states combined, and possibly hinder-
ing the meagre 1% economic growth
expected in the EU zone in 2010.
Surely Eyjafjallajökull (“Ay! You fergot
la yoghurt!” or just EJ for short) is an
anarchist.
In the severely underreported stu-
dent uprisings throughout California
last October, one of the novelties in
their published materials was the dec-
laration, rejuvenated from the sixties,
to ‘demand nothing’: occupying and
paralyzing universities throughout the
state the students declared they made
no particular demands, no structural
reforms: ‘a free university in the midst
of a capitalist society is like a reading
room in a prison; it serves only as a dis-
traction from the misery of daily life.’
(Communiqué from an absent future”
After the fall – Communiqués from
Occupied California). Published Feb-
ruary 2010). Instead, paraphrases the
volcano, we seek to channel the anger
of the dispossessed tourists and airline
workers into a declaration of war.
A PRECISE OPERATION
Now, sorry for the harsh interpre-
tation—it was the radical students
in California who spoke of war and
which went surprisingly unnoticed
by the global media. EJ is far more
sophisticated in its approach, not say-
ing a word, so not a word can be mis-
interpreted. As is quite evident from
its course of action it means no harm
to people. This is a precise operation,
designed for maximal effect in the fol-
lowing three ways:
1. To bring a huge industry to stand-
still for as long as possible, considered
good per se, by radical volcanoes, as
economic growth in a capitalist sys-
tem equals strengthening hierarchies,
while
2. thus revealing to the general pop-
ulation who relies on the services
involved how vulnerable it is, this
system taken for granted by as all, sup-
posedly serving our needs, economic
and otherwise—laughing in the face
of globalisation and opening up a gap
in the veil of alienation, society’s wil-
fully enforced ignorance of its actual
truths and
3. delaying global warming catastro-
phe for a day or two.
All this amounts—or so the the-
ory motivating the volcano obviously
goes—to a wake-up call.
In the face of that wake-up call,
the volcano would hope that collateral
damage, such as underpaid workers
in Kenya, in the UK and elsewhere
losing their jobs, will channel their
frustrations into a demand for radical
change, a system sustainable to hu-
mans and the rest of life, that would
make livelihood and human dignity
independent from whimsical market
conditions and unsustainable means
of travel.
MASKED ACTIvISM
As other anarchist activists before
it, the volcano does not reveal its
face—even underneath the hood of
its smoke it shows only a mask, its
three craters resembling a distorted
version of Munch’s Scream, accord-
ing to some interpreters. Having no
particular face, no identifiable person
or organisation behind it, the volcano
stays out of reach of counter-strikes
or retaliation. Unlike, for example,
France’s Tarnac 9, the group of young
anarcho-communists who in 2008
were arrested on the basis of suspi-
cion that they had written The Com-
ing Insurrection (officially written by
‘the Invisible Committee’, available in
English translation here)—a booklet
urging action to interrupt the flows
of capital more or less precisely the
way EJ currently does, though never
hinting at any action of such volcanic
magnitude.
For those interested in events, the
eruption is already far more inter-
esting than parliament’s 3,000 page
report on Iceland’s financial crisis,
or even its appendix on ethics. There
are those who would like to see the
volcano as a mercenary mountain
on the state’s payroll. They cite the
fact that the Nordic heathen society’s
high-priest and Sigur rós collaborator,
Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson, did invoke a
curse against the UK and Holland for
the unsettled IceSave accounts, over a
year ago. After the ritual he concocted
this rhyme in English:
“In London town this lying clown
our land he drowns and shatters.
Gordon Brown is going down,
his good renown in tatters.”
Proponents of this theory will also
find support in the fact that the €200
million losses that the ashes cause
the airline industry alone—daily—
already amount to approximately the
whole unsettled IceSave debt. This,
however, is merely so much national-
ist propaganda, belittling the autono-
my of independent actors and thwart-
ing the volcano’s more radical and
far-reaching agenda under a screen
of natural mysticism and foreseeable
over-interpretation of coincidence. No,
this mountain may address all those
who hear it, but it acts only in its own
name, in defiance of all hierarchies
and orders, a defiance underlined in
the details of its calculated side-ef-
fects: deployment of arms to Afghani-
stan gets delayed, while soldiers on
their way back home on leave make a
detour on train and ferry.
A POTENTIAL STALIN LIES
DORMANT
The event is ongoing and remains
open for interpretation. Perhaps come
next week, it will not be amusing at
all. Geologists tell us nothing about
what lies ahead, but musicologists in-
sist that if this piece is composed, the
first two acts clearly have the structure
of a prelude and there must be more
to come. Behind the corner the more
easily pronounceable Mt. Katla lies
dormant, less of an anarchist, more
of a potential Stalin, purges and all.
Its eruption might mean the end of
Iceland. Last time it erupted it meant
the end of monarchy in France, which
most of us have come to appreciate.
Not that being stuck with your fam-
ily for an extra week in Tenerife is any
laughing stock, let alone calling out
the Navy for your rescue. Googling “I
hate Iceland” already gives 147,000 re-
sults, dwarfing “I love Iceland” and its
meagre 46,000 hits. Then again, anar-
chists have never really been strong in
popularity contests. As of yet—unlike
September 11, 2001—the last time
airlines were interrupted on a com-
parable scale—this catastrophe has
not become a deadly one, and the ac-
tivist volcano shows no sign of fascist
tendencies. The event remains nearly
as virtual as a computer meltdown
and its potential just as real. As long
as that’s the case, I feel mildly proud
of my place of origin. Never mind the
people or its politicians: this tectonic
intersection is intelligent and daring.

12
We are afraid the lovely James might be jinxing us by play-
ing the guessing-game like this. It's still a damn fine read.
Hot Topic | Political mountains
HAUKUR MáR HELGASON
JAMES ASHWORTH
JULIA STAPLES
The Erupting Insurrection
Is Eyjafjallajökull an anarchist volcano?
Hot Topic | Volcanos
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 06 — 2010
The Unusual Suspects
Which of Iceland's volcanoes could blow next?