Kerlingarfjöll by János Kovács, distributed by EGU under a Creative Commons licence.
Iceland, with its stunning volcanic landscapes, is one of the world’s most geologically rich countries. Kerlingarfjöll, featured in this week’s image, is a prime example of that. This Icelandic mountain range, covering an area of 150 square kilometres, formed during a volcanic eruption in the Late Pleistocene – some 100 thousand years ago.
“Kerlingarfjöll is very different to the environment around, both in shape and colour. The mountains are mostly made out of rhyolite and both dark and bright tuff, and there is also a lot of volcanic glass,” it is explained in the Kerlingarfjöll official website. “When Kerlingarfjoll was being created, there was a glacier over the mid highlands, and in certain places it seems that pillars of tuff reached out of the melting glacier ice. That is why there are tuff pillars with a lava top.”
The mountains are located in central Iceland, in an area of stunning natural beauty. “I had the chance to visit this beautiful country several times in the last ten years,” the photographer János Kovács, a geologist based at the University of Pécs in Hungary, says. “If anyone wants to see the real Iceland, they should rent a big 4×4 and drive through the country.”
Imaggeo is the online open access geosciences image repository of the European Geosciences Union. Every geoscientist who is an amateur photographer (but also other people) can submit their images to this repository. Being open access, it can be used by scientists for their presentations or publications as well as by the press. If you submit your images to imaggeo, you retain full rights of use, since they are licenced and distributed by EGU under a Creative Commons licence.
