A European country could suddenly cease to exist due to a natural disaster.
Scientists say Iceland could be destroyed by volcanoes.
Climate change could trigger a chain of catastrophic events, Reuters reports.
Iceland has a fairly cold climate. There are massive glaciers that play an important role. They restrain volcanic activity, scientists say.
Their melting removes a kind of centuries-old shackles from the volcanoes.
If now experts can predict the eruption of a particular volcano, then later their activity may become uncontrollable.
This means that the island nation could be destroyed by a sudden massive eruption.
And scientists can't predict when this will happen. It could happen in the coming years or even decades.
Historical data supports this hypothesis. A similar scenario unfolded here when the island was not yet inhabited.
About 10,000-15,000 years ago, the glaciers here also melted. Because of this, volcanic activity here increased 30-50 times.
The area of Iceland is estimated at 103 thousand square kilometers, which is comparable to the Saratov region. At the same time, there are at least 25 active volcanoes on the territory of the country.
Author: Dmitry Bobrov
