Iceland faces daunting period after lava from volcano destroys homes in fishing town, president says

By MARCO DI MARCO
Associated Press

REYKJAVIK, Iceland (AP) — Iceland’s president says the country is battling “tremendous forces of nature” after molten lava from a volcano consumed several houses in the evacuated town of Grindavik. President Gudni Th. Johannesson said in a televised address late Sunday that “a daunting period of upheaval has begun” on the Reykjanes Peninsula in the southwest. A volcano on the peninsula erupted for the second time in less than a month on Sunday. Authorities had ordered residents to leave the fishing town of Grindavik hours earlier. Scientists said Monday that the eruption appeared to be subsiding. But it was too soon to declare the danger had passed. Iceland’s Meteorological Office said “it is difficult to estimate how long this eruption will last.”