Jökull - 01.12.2003, Qupperneq 43

The 1783–1785 Laki-Grímsvötn eruptions
Table B: Explosive activity, continued.
Date Index Source Quotation
10 June B15 4, p. 9 ...heavy overcast with pungent/acrid rainfall, which caused unbearable smarting in the eyes and on bare skin upon contact
and dizziness in the head. Some raindrops burned holes in the dock leaves as they fell on them and scorched the skin in
newly sheared sheep.
10 June B16 10, p. 14 ...separate columns of fire were seen for the first time rising up above the mountains in the north; the ashy cloud rose higher
and higher every day and earthquakes along with rumbling and cracking increased day by day. [Magnús Stephensen did
not witness the Laki eruption and his descriptions of the eruption are based on other eyewitness accounts. The description
is very similar to the one Steingrímsson gives for 8 June. It appears that the date 10 June is a mistake by Stephensen.]
11 June B17 4, p. 9 Snowfall and snowdrift in easterly wind, that was derived from the plume.
11 June B18 5, p. 274 ...on the fourth day of the eruption I [Jón Eiríksson at Ljótarstaðir in Skaftártunga] saw two additional columns of fire north
of the first one and it seemed to be positioned in Skaftárjökull glacier. [The line of sight from Skaftártunga to the eruption
site is such that a northeast shift appears to be toward the north.]
11 June B19 8, p. 420 That night, right after we had put up our tent again, it started snowing and when we had slept through part of the night,
...we were woken up by three enormous cracking sounds so we saddled our horses in a hurry and rode back to the district
in a snow drift and dense ash-fall.
11–14 June B20 7, p. 281 As one could clearly see three separate columns of fire and smoke it is possible that the fire emerged from more than one
source, which opened about the same time. These columns of fire and smoke were easily seen from the Rangárvellir district
during 11, 12, 13 and 14 June. After that came a haze containing dust particles, which did not only spread all over the
southern Iceland but also eastern, western and northern Iceland, and blocked the view.
12 June B21 10, p. 15 A huge dark volcanic cloud emerged in the NW and dispersed a great volume of ash, scoria, sulfuric material and greyish
hairy material [over the Síða district]; the land was covered by badly smelling and tormenting smoke which blocked the
sunlight; the sun was seen through this dense smoke and sulfuric mist as a blood-red indistinct globe. Earthquakes and
cracking sounds were frequent and the eruption site was seen through the dense cloud of smoke and mist as numerous
columns of fire north of the mountains bordering the Síða district. [Stephensen contradicts his source here. Steingrímsson
does not mention tephra-fall on 12 June in any of his descriptions. However, Stephensen’s description is similar to that of
Steingrímsson from 14 June both in style and content].
12 June–21
July
B22 3, p. 70 This absurdity and enormity continued with thunder and lightning in the air, but earthquakes and din in the earth from 12
June to 21 July. This activity was west of and within my [Steingrímsson] parish. When activity dwindled on this eldgjá
[Útnorðursgjá] another [Landnorðursgjá] began to erupt east and north of us and desolated by ash-fall a whole parish,
named Kálfafell [i.e., Fljótshverfi].
13 June B23 2, p. 59 ...loud claps and cracking sounds were heard from the eldgjá, the column of steam was so high that it was seen from Sel-
vogsheiði in Gullbringusýsla and surrounding districts to the west, [i.e., Reykjanes peninsula, distance from Laki fissures
∼250 km.]
13 June B24 4, p. 9 The ash and the steam plume was so high that it was seen all over the country, west to moors in Gullbringusýsla ...the
weather was calm and clear with wind of southwest. Loud claps and cracking sounds were heard here from the northwest,
along with earthquakes, also boiling and noises like commonly heard around waterfalls or as many forge hearths were
blown at the same time. This noise and rumble were continuously heard from this direction for the next three weeks.
13 June B25 2, p. 59 This same day a few men climbed the mountains bordering the Síða district to explore and locate these fires. They saw
20 columns of fire in the so-called Úlfarsdalur Valley, which is situated north of the Síða highlands, and two of them were
indescribably large and they saw 7 other columns in the hillocks north [correct is to the east] of the valley. [Total of 27 fire
fountains were seen in Úlfarsdalur Valley, which is actually the numbers of openings on the two western most fissures of
the Laki cone-row.]
13 June B26 4,p 12 The activity was intense north of the mountains bordering the Síða district, with cracking and crashing sounds, fire and
haze, along with earthquakes such that no one was certain whether the settlement was going to be saved. Therefore
3 farmers, who lived at the farm Mörtunga, climbed up to the highest lookout on Kaldbakur mountain to evaluate the
progress of these fires in the pasture. They saw, as it appeared to them, fires in Úlfarsdalur Valley and they could recognise
22 columns of fire emerging from the fissure.
14 June B27 2, p. 60 ...huge amount of hairy sand was dispersed all over [Síða], but in early evening a heavy rainfall occurred from the plume
so pestiferous and smelly that breathing became difficult for people with respiratory problems.
14 June B28 2, p. 60 The before mentioned hairy sand-fall and sulfurous rain caused such unwholesomeness in the air and the earth that the
grass became yellow and pink and withered down to the roots. The animals that wandered around the fields got yellow
colored and sore feet, and yellow spots were seen on the skin of newly shorn cheeps, which had died.
14 June B29 4, p. 10 ...huge volume of ash, which contained more hairs than previous ash-fall on 9 June [correct date is 8 June], which were
bluish black and glittering, their length and thickness was similar as a hair of a seal (it has been reported that they contained
iron and copper mixture); and they completely covered the ground. Where the hair fell on bare ground it was rolled up
into elongated, hollow bundles by the wind. In the night that same day a heavy rain fell from the plume, despite the
southeasterly breeze, which had muddy or light-blue colour and very bitter and smelly so that people with respiratory
problems could hardly breathe and were dizzy. All summer birds and nesting birds fled, their eggs that were left behind
were hardly edible because of their bitter and sulfurous taste.
15–17 June B30 2, p. 60 ...thunder continued to be heard from the cloud...
16 June B31 4, p. 12 The din and the cracking, the fires and the stench along with the earthquakes to the north of the mountains bordering Síða
was so frenzied, that no one was sure whether this settlement was safe.
JÖKULL No. 53, 2003 41