Jökull - 01.12.1967, Page 16

the ice-cap and. reach down to the foot of the
mountain. Steinsholt is also itself deeply dis-
sectecl with gullies that divide it into spurs ancl
ridges. The glacier to the east, called Steins-
holtsjökull, creeps along and undercuts one of
these ridges, called Innstihaus, in Steinsholt.
FIRST PFIASE: ROCKSLIDE
The Steinsholt hlaup started as a rockslide
from the eastern side of Innstihaus that moved
down onto the glacier. Some 7—8 years before
the hlaup, shepherds from the neighbouring
farms had noticed a narrow “bottomless” crack
running approximately along the ridge-shaped
summit of Innstihaus. The crack seemed to be
new, and afterwards it widened year by year.
It liad become about one foot wide in the
autumn of 1966. After a few days of thaw
with extraordinarily heavy rain and melting of
snow near Mid-January, 1967, the mountain
side to the east of this crack slid down. This
happened on Sunday, January 15th, at 13 h.
47 min.
Fig. 2. Map of the Steinsholt area before the rockslide, drawn by Á. Bödvarsson from aerial
photographs taken by the Icelandic Survey Department in 1960.
2. mynd. Kort af Steinsholti fyrir hrunið (sbr. 3. mynd). Agúst Böðvarsson teiknaði eftir flug-
myndum Landmœlinga íslands frá 1960.
250 JÖKULL 17. ÁR