People in south-west Iceland remain on edge as they wait to see whether a volcano rumbling under the Reykjanes peninsula will erupt.
Civil protection authorities said that even if it does not, it is likely to be months before residents evacuated from the danger zone can safely return home.
The fishing town of Grindavik was evacuated a week ago as magma rumbled and snaked under the earth amid thousands of earthquakes. The seismic activity has left a jagged crack running through the town, thrusting the ground upward in places by 1 metre (3ft) or more.
The Icelandic meteorological office said there was a “significant likelihood” that an eruption would occur somewhere along the 9-mile (15km) magma tunnel, and that the “prime location” was an area north of Grindavik near the Hagafell mountain.
Grindavik, a town with a population of 3,400, is situated on the Reykjanes peninsula, about 31 miles south-west of the capital, Reykjavik, and not far from Keflavik airport, Iceland’s main facility for international flights. The nearby Blue Lagoon geothermal resort, one of Iceland’s top tourist attractions, has been shut until at least the end of November because of the danger from the volcano.
People in Grindavik have been allowed to return for five minutes each to rescue valuable possessions and pets.
A volcanic system on the Reykjanes peninsula has erupted three times since 2021, after being dormant for 800 years. Previous eruptions occurred in remote valleys without causing damage.
Iceland sits above a volcanic hotspot in the north Atlantic and averages an eruption every four to five years. The most disruptive in recent times was the 2010 eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano, which spewed huge clouds of ash into the atmosphere and grounded flights across Europe for days because of fears that ash could damage airplane engines.
Scientists say a new eruption would probably produce lava but not an ash cloud.