[Image via Olivier A. A. Vandeginste/Shutterstock.com]
Eyjafjallajökull Volcano
Estimated Date:April 14, 2010
Location: Iceland
VEI Rating: 4
The Eyjafjallajökull volcano, located in Iceland, happens to be one of the few major volcano eruptions to occur in our lifetime. The eruptions here lasted for about 6 days starting on April 14th while localized disruption continued into May 2010. However, eruptive activity STILL kept going until June 2010. Finally, after another three months of activity, the eruptions were finally over in October 2010. From April 14th to the 20th, ash from the eruption covered large areas of Northern Europe. All in all, around 20 countries were affected so badly by it that they had to close off air travel to commercial flights.
[Image via Olivier A. A. Vandeginste/Shutterstock.com]This affected millions of people, but things could have been much worse. Geologists, as well as volcanic experts, had been keeping an eye on Eyjafjallajökull for a while. However, they noticed near the end of 2009 that seismic activity had started and ended up increasing far more by March 2010. This is when a small eruption took place, but by April 2010, it officially went into crazy mode. It ejected around 250 million cubic yards of tephra and an ash plume rose to 30,000 feet. By June 2010, a small but new crater opened up on the west side of the main crater. Overall, it was one of the most impactful eruptions in recent memory.