about a month ago, there was like this storm of seismic activity as a huge volume of magma was shifting underground and then rose up right beneath this town, which was what prompted its evacuation. so last night, you know, there was another earthquake swarm and then this explosion and this lava fountaining towards the sky. and thank goodness it's to the northeast of this town. the danger is not done yet. this is as close as we could get to the volcano before the authorities stopped us. overnight, more lava has continued to flow. and this is something that is very difficult to predict, which is why the authorities are warning people to stay away from this area for their safety. icelanders are familiar with volcanic activity. known as the land of fire and ice, the country is home to several volcanoes and straddles two tectonic plates.

various small are towns scattered across the reykjanes peninsula. the town of volga is just north of the eruption, and the plumes of fire are very visible during night—time. the eruptions' glow could also be seen from the capital reykjavik, which is only a 45 minutes drive from the eruption site. by the autumn of 2023, southwest iceland was experiencing increasing earthquake activity. come november, emergency precautions commenced. this is grindavik, the small town in iceland, which has been evacuated over fears of a volcanic eruption. thousands of tremors have rocked the region in the last few days, like this one. you need to stay tough in these situations and that part is pretty much exhausting. there's no relaxing now. translation: this is| a very strange feeling. i've been tearful. it's been a long 2a hours.

even though it's been a very difficult time, it's heart—warming to see the solidarity in times like this. this is an unprecedented situation. since the 25th of october, we've recorded almost 30,000 earthquakes on the peninsula in southwest iceland. as we've been doing for many years now, planning for volcanic activity, planning aggressively to be able to defend areas, to increase monitoring. and this is exactly where we are. we're almost at war with mother nature yet again in iceland. wow. oh, my god! in spite of the country's preparedness for an eruption, it still prompts fears of infrastructure damage and the risk to life posed by fire and toxic fumes. that means measures have to be taken to keep people safe. everybody... evacuation?

in november, bbc news crews were permitted access to speak to residents before they left the town. how does it feel having to pack up all your belongings like this? it's horrible. yeah, just terrible. just getting things for my kids and getting out of here. they have five minutes to decide what to save from further earthquakes or a possible eruption. you really feel the town could be destroyed? yeah, i believe so. it's already, half. of it is destroyed. and the next few hours or days will tell us what is _ going to happen. suddenly, we're told we've got to go. there was a bit of a commotion and we were told the whole area was being evacuated. a stream of cars, those that were in grindavik, left. everyone seemed to be packing up. it was, we later hear, alarm that magma may be nearing the surface nearby.

earthquakes have caused ground deformation, with rifts and cracks of a metre in depth reported in roads. many roads are just wrecked, like a maze, which you have to drive through. icelandic authorities build bulwarks, large walls of soil to provide protection for a power plant and the famous blue lagoon and natural spa. the purpose of this barrier is to divert the lava. the power plant is very important infrastructure. it's supplying most of the peninsula with hot water. so we cannot afford to lose it. the lagoon is still closed. we've had a series of eruptions in the last few years from the peninsula, which is the southwest of iceland. and this is the latest manifestation. and there was a lot of precursory signals before this eruption. it was obviously ready to go

for some period of time. i mean, one of the really interesting questions from volcanologists' perspective is what is the final trigger that makes it actually go? in the last hour, all flights in and out of the uk - have been cancelled because of the safety threat from a cloud l of volcanic ash. the weather condition at the volcano was quite difficult. it was raining. a dramatic volcanic eruption back in 2010 closed european airspace. this volcano has turned the uk into a no—fly zone. but it's not expected that this latest volcano event will cause such widescale disruption. to get that kind of ash cloud

that we saw in 2010, that kind of sustained ash cloud that was really punching up through the atmosphere, you need to kind of erupt a lot of lava like into an ice sheet, which kind of cools it really quickly and causes this kind of explosive generation of ash. you don't really have any ice sheets or ice caps in this part. you know, there's obviously like frost and a bit of ice on the ground, but it's much more of a local hazard this time. the authorities here say that they have everything under control, that this does not pose a threat to life, that they had been expecting this to happen for weeks. there are around 30 volcanic systems in iceland, and there is some research that suggests that the risk of eruptions could increase as climate change melts glaciers. the current deglaciation that's occurring in iceland is affecting our volcanoes and magma bodies that are residing beneath these volcanoes in three ways. so firstly, more melt is being generated at great depth in the mantle.

secondly, it could be affecting migration pathways within the upper crust. and thirdly, it could be changing the stress field in the upper crust around existing magma bodies. so in the future, this could mean either more frequent or larger eruptions. following this latest eruption, smoke and fumes filled the air, with iceland's met office warning that pollution could hit the country's capital, reykjavik. but i can tell you, we can still smell the smoke. we can see ashes floating in the air, and every so often, we can feel the vibration under our feet. the biggest risk at the moment for people who live near the volcano are volcanic fumes. they are not dangerous, but they can be very unpleasant. when a volcano erupts, as well as the lava that we can see that's fountaining out,

there's also gas that comes out that's been with the magma, the molten rock that's been brought to the surface. some of it's harmless, like water vapour. but then we also have carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide. and it's that sulphur dioxide, the one that's that eggy smell, it smells like rotten eggs and it can cause acid rain. it can cause irritation in the eyes if it's in strong enough concentrations and it can cause respiratory issues. there were no initial reports of injuries, but fears remain that houses and buildings could be damaged. so behind me, we have iceland's newest addition. it's slowly getting more quiet, but it might last a long time. might last a short time, who knows? but it'sjust in time for christmas. and hopefully, it will just stay like this or stop because this could _ affect some infrastructure. it was much more activity last night, with fire fountains reaching maybe 150 metres. the activity has gone down a little bit or quite a lot. so it's very stable now. this volcano's eruption is currently weakening, but the authorities

are warning that new vents could open at a moment's notice. vents are openings on a volcano through which magma erupts or gases are emitted. now, in terms of what happens next, iceland's volcano experts say that this eruption could continue for weeks and possibly even months. but months is not soon enough for the local residents who are having to spend christmas away from home. they probably think there's a chance that it opens up somewhere else and then it's going to be closer to grindavik. so i don't see that in the near future they will let people get close to grindavik. volcanologists say this could be the start of a new era of activity in the region. i think it's not the new norm. it'sjust the norm

for us icelanders. we have evacuated the whole town 50 years ago on the islands, we have had several cases of volcanic eruptions, always, because this isjust part of who we are, the country we live in. in spite of the dramatic scenes, many icelanders are unfazed. well, it started big, _ but it's getting really small now, so i'm not very worried about it. i read one sentence this morning and it said something about dancing. so i guess this is a huge festival for the spirit or, you know, it should be something very good. the bad thing about the situation is all of the people that had to leave their homes and leave everything behind and don't know if they will ever go back. and that's why, we don't know what's happening. is it over? will it be over tomorrow or the one week or...? or can we expect a bigger eruption again in the same fissure or somewhere else?

this is the same question for the people who live here, endless, regarding this volcano or the others. we just have to wait and see. hello there. we've got typical festive fare to come over the next few days. i'll show you that in a moment. today was another mild one, temperatures widely in double figures. there was even a bit of sunshine coming through the cloud as well. different story in scotland where we've had a wintry scene across northern parts of the mainland. the snow that was falling here has since turned to rain. and it's quite misty and murky, very wet at the moment. but the rain will ease off in scotland and northern ireland. the main rain band pushing down towards southern parts of england and across the northern isles. it'll be followed by some clearer spells for northern parts of the uk and a few showers. and it's going to be a mild start

to sunday morning, christmas eve, but it's going to be a windy day for all of us on christmas eve, particularly so over and to the east of the pennines, could be quite difficult for driving high sided vehicles up and down the a1. very windy conditions also, widely in scotland with the strongest gusts 70 miles an hour in northern parts of the mainland and across 0rkney. and those really strong winds will drive in lots of blustery showers across scotland. sunshine and showers will follow to northern ireland, northern england and eventually north wales and the north midlands as our main band of clouds sinks southwards, bringing rain for a while in wales and then more towards the south west of england in the afternoon. temperatures could actually reach 15 degrees across eastern parts of england, but those numbers do drop a little bit during the afternoon. cooler air is coming in behind that weather front there. that's bringing the rain and the cloud across southern areas. it's going to sit around overnight and will still be there into christmas morning. but we've got another weather system to the north and the two will combine to bring a lot of cloud, rain developing quite widely, some snow over the hills across northern

scotland where the air is that bit colder, but otherwise, another mild day. temperatures could reach 1a degrees in the southeast with the blustery winds. now, those two weather systems will sweep away overnight. things will calm down as we head into boxing day. the winds will be lighter. it's still a bit blustery across the north and west of scotland with a few wintry showers here just for a while. otherwise, a lot of dry weather, plenty of sunshine around. there is some rain in the channel, that'll push back towards the far south west of england. temperatures will be a little bit lower. so let's summarise the next few days. we've got the strong winds and mild weather for christmas eve that could bring some travel disruption, then rain develops for christmas day. if you're out on boxing day, it looks sunny.

live from london. this is bbc news. a minute's silence is held in prague to remember the victims of thursday's mass shooting.

gaza's health ministry says 200 people have been killed and hundreds of others injured over 2a hours as israel's bombardment continues. a woman in the us with a rare double womb has given birth twice in two days — after a "one in the million" pregnancy. and rebecca welch makes history — becoming the first female premier league referee. hello and welcome to bbc news. i'm lukwesa burak. we start in the czech republic. a minute's silence has been held for the 1a people shot dead by a student at a university in the captial, prague. thursday's attack also left dozens injured. the czech prime minister has described the "pain and sorrow" of an entire societyjust before christmas. the gunman killed himself after he was surrounded by police. from prague, sarah rainsford sent this report.