Eyjafjallajökull by Celine Choo - flickr.com/sunshee
How about that volcano, huh?
How about the fact that a mountain on a far-away, ice-covered island exploded into flame? How about the fact that, minutes later, the entire world knew about it?
How about the fact that nobody died?
It’s exciting stuff, all of it. Eyjafjallajökull’s eruption sparked a lot of reaction, a lot of photography, a lot of speculation, 800 evacuations, a zillion stranded travelers, and a general hubbub on the ho-hum Internet.
While it won’t go down in the books as one of history’s biggest eruptions, Eyjafjallajökull served as yet another demonstration of how our world is linked and increasingly interdependent thanks to technology and freedom of information.
Here are some of my favorite reactions from the past week:
1. The Oatmeal
click to view entire comic at theoatmeal.com
Matthew Inman, as usual, makes the best funny.
2. Information Is Beautiful
Planes or Volcanos by Information Is Beautiful - informationisbeautiful.net
Nothing like a good infographic to put things in perspective. David McCandless and Ben Bartels caught a little flak for making this chart with bad numbers at first. They responded by adjusting the figures, which (unsurprisingly) are still impressive.
3. The Photos!
click for more Eyjafjallajökull!
Boston.com compiled some truly incredible images from the eruption. They’re all copyrighted, so I can’t post them here, but trust me when I say it’s worth your time to click through and see the volcanic fantasticness.
There’s a wee preview at left, and if you don’t click it you’re a fool.
NASA and some brave amateur photographers have also been posting photos. More amazing shots are below.
Overall, it was quite a show, especially for a girl in a Reno apartment who has never seen Iceland or lava or red lightning. Thanks, Internet.
Volcanic Eruption Eyjafjallajökull by Fridgeirsson. Taken from 10km away. flickr.com/fridgeirsson
Volcanic ash sunset at Wimpole Hall in England - flickr.com/dumbledad
Eyjafjallajökull Glacier Volcano - flickr.com/hrannsa
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2 non-facebook comments
Great post! SO much lush information on this magma zit. The photos are stunning, especially the lightening ones.
I heard Jeffrey Callison on Capitol Public Radio interviewing a vulcanologist about the eruption
http://tinyurl.com/2afygmu
What was hilarious was his perfect pronunciation of Eyjafjallajökull in his thick Scottish accent. It simply wasn’t crap
Oh man, I have been practicing pronouncing that word, but I can’t do it without reading along! Not easy.
Thanks for the link, and the props :)