Eyjafordur (Eyjafirði): a large landslide in Iceland yesterday

With thanks to Iain Johnson (@iainjg), who posted this to Twitter, a large landslide occurred in the Eyjafordur (Eyjafirði) area of northern Iceland yesterday.  This image, Tweeted by Iain, shows that this was a large and mobile slide:-

The Eyjafordur landslide in Iceland. Image tweeted by Iain Johnson

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The landslide was also caught on video, which can be viewed here.  The owners of the house close to the toe of the landslide appear to have had a lucky escape.  The reports indicate that the landslide stopped about 100 m from the house (the camera lens has significantly foreshortened the distance in the image above).

A better impression of the scale of the landslide can be gained from this image, posted to mbl.is:-

The Eyjafordur landslide in Iceland. Image posted by mbl.is.

Interestingly, the accompanying article reports that the area was not affected by heavy rainfall at the time of the landslide, but that in recent days individual rocks have rolled down the slope, perhaps suggesting precursory landslide movement.

There is a pretty good news report (in Icelandic) of the aftermath of the landslide, which includes this stunning aerial image:-

Drone image of the aftermath of the Eyjafordur landslide in Iceland. Image posted by www.ruv.is.

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Quickslide 1: A Department of Disaster resilience in the Philippines

The Philippines is establishing a new Department of Disaster Resilience to “improve the government’s capacity for disaster risk reduction and management”. This is a very interesting and very positive move from a country that is subject to multiple hazards.

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Quickslide 2: Nepal struggles to re-establish border trade with Tibet

The devastating landslides in the 2020 summer monsoon have meant that the Kodari border crossing into Tibet was closed for three months, causing serious economic harm.  My Republica reports that it was reopened on Monday, but was then closed again on Tuesday due to Covid-19.