Video: Iceland's most active volcano erupts

Iceland closed the main international airport and canceled domestic flights after the country's most active volcano, Grimsvotn, began erupting.

Grimsvot volcano has created a column of dust and smoke up to 20km into the sky. Keflavik International Airport has been closed. Hjordis Gudmundsdottir, a spokesman for the civil aviation administration agency Isavia, said: ' We have closed the area until we know more about the impact that dust can cause.'

However , the Icelandic Meteorological Agency said the eruption would not cause a serious disruption to air traffic like last year's eruption of Eyjafjallajokul . An eruption of Eyjafjallajokul volcano in 2010 caused a large area of ​​European airspace to be closed, causing paralysis of European air traffic.

Meteorologist at the University of Iceland, Magnus Tumi Gudmundsson, said it was Grimsvotn 's most powerful eruption in the last 100 years, 'much bigger and stronger than Eyjafjallajokull'.

But Mr. Gudmundsson added that ash from Grimsvotn volcano is bigger than Eyjafjallajokull's ash, so they fall to the ground faster instead of flying away.

The non-European traffic control organization yesterday said that Grimsvotn volcano has not had any impact on Europe or transatlantic flights. However, weather officials have warned that ash could fly to northern Scotland on Tuesday and areas of England, France, Spain and Thursday or Friday if the plague continues with speed. current level.

Grimsvotn is located in Europe's largest glacier, Vatnajokull in southeast Iceland.

In the most recent eruption in 2004, south-Atlantic transatlantic flights across Iceland had to be diverted but no airport was closed.

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