Jökull - 01.01.2021, Page 75

Álftaver’s experience of the 1918 Katla eruption
It was a busy time of year in Álftaver in the lead
up to the 1918 eruption. Able-bodied men were gath-
ering sheep and herding them down from the sum-
mer pastures as part of their routine, annual activities.
Other farmers were at the sheep sorting pens north
of the Skálm river ready to receive the sheep, while
many women, children, youngsters and the elderly,
were at home on the farms, preparing for the arrival
of the herders and sorters. Based on oral and writ-
ten accounts, there is no doubt that the eruption took
people by surprise. With the spread of people over
the region, and due to their initiative in documenting
what they witnessed and experienced, they have pro-
vided us with a critical insight into the suddenness,
and destructiveness of Katla.
Until now, much of this history has only been
accessible in Icelandic text and through oral stories,
passed down by older generations. The aim of this pa-
per is to unlock these stories for an international audi-
ence in an effort to advance understanding of volcanic
eruptions and their impacts and, inform future emer-
gency planning. As Pyle (2018, p. 458) highlights
“reading of a wider range of contemporary sources
that document the broader personal, social, economic
and political impacts of prior events will enrich and
add to our capacity to anticipate, prepare for and mit-
igate the consequences of future events.”
The importance of this work, however, extends be-
yond providing an international audience with a vivid
account, including detailed maps, of what people ex-
perienced and felt during the 1918 Katla eruption. It
also considers present-day emergency response strate-
gies, which up until recently focused solely on miti-
gating the impact of glacial outburst floods produced
during a Katla eruption. Following this, the paper
describes how the farmers’ experiences of the 1918
Katla eruption have influenced current perceptions
and the impact this may have on behaviour in rela-
tion to emergency response strategies. The discussion
section highlights how these findings support the need
to adopt participatory approaches for the development
of emergency response plans. By including local res-
idents as partners in the planning process, participa-
tory approaches promote critical dialogue and the co-
production of knowledge among officials and resi-
dents and, they are increasingly recognised as best-
practice methods for developing disaster risk reduc-
tion strategies1 (Cronin et al., 2004, Barclay et al.,
2008, Cadag et al., 2018).
To provide context, we first consider the commu-
nity of Álftaver and flood hazards2 from Katla before
detailing experiences of the 1918 eruption.
ÁLFTAVER AND FLOOD HAZARDS
FROM KATLA
Eruptions within the Katla caldera (Figure 1) are com-
monly followed by catastrophic outburst floods called
jökulhlaups. The outburst flood in 1918 emanated
from the Kötlujökull glacier outlet, about the same
time as the eruption column was observed in the Vík
village (Jóhannsson, 1919).
Outwash plains associated with jökulhlaups
caused by Katla eruptions can be found in the low-
land west, south and east of Mýrdalsjökull ice cap but
also to the north (Figure 1). Mýrdalssandur–the east-
ward outwash plain–was flooded on eight occasions in
the last 400 years because of Katla eruptions (Larsen,
2018). The resulting jökulhlaup is a mix–in various
proportions–of water, boulders of ice and slush, rocks,
sediments, and tephra; proportion not only varies be-
tween floods but also for each flood as they propagate
on the outwash plain (Larsen, 2018).
Due to the speed at which these outburst floods
develop and their sheer size in terms of velocity, vol-
ume and debris load, the jökulhlaups caused by Katla
1“Disaster risk reduction strategies and policies define goals and objectives across different timescales and with concrete targets, indi-
cators and time frames. In line with the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, these should be aimed at preventing
the creation of disaster risk, the reduction of existing risk and the strengthening of economic, social, health and environmental resilience.”
https://www.undrr.org/terminology/disaster-risk-reduction
2“Hazards may be natural, anthropogenic or socionatural in origin.” https://www.undrr.org/terminology/hazard. In this paper, we refer
to hazards as those associated with natural processes and phenomena, unless stated otherwise.
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