In Iceland, this town is enduring 1000 earthquakes a day, but the ...
When Australian teacher Stephanie Langridge moved to Iceland from Sydney seven years ago, she never imagined she would one day drive willingly into an active volcano "red zone".
More than 1,000 earthquakes a day are rumbling the fishing village of Grindavik, where a 15-kilometre fracture has opened in the ground.
They're considered the precursor to an eruption and scientists predict lava could begin spurting out fissure at any moment.
Ms Langridge and her Icelandic husband are members of a search and rescue team that escorts evacuated residents back into the town's most dangerous areas to retrieve items they left behind.
"At the moment it is still safe for us to go in," Ms Langridge said.
"We're updated hourly, even sometimes minute-to-minute, on what the conditions are. If and when it does erupt, then we will be ready as we're needed."
The fishing town of Grindavik has been evacuated, for good reason.(Reuters: Marko Djurica)
Australians are no strangers to natural disasters, with emergency services battling fires and floods on a routine basis.
In Iceland, volcanic activity is their bread and butter.
An April 2010 eruption sparked an ash cloud that closed European air space for six days and forced the cancellation of more than 100,000 flights.
People may picture a large mountain spurting smoke and lava, however, in this part of the country, the activity happens below the ground.
"If you look at the charts, there's something happening almost every year or every few years here, so the concept that something might be erupting soon isn't at all strange to us," Ms Langridge said.
Stephanie Langridge surveys a storage facility of emergency equiptment in Iceland.(ABC News: Tom Joyner)
If and when an eruption happens, it will mean lava coming through the 15km fracture.
What is unique about this predicted event, is it's the first time in 50 years that an Icelandic town might be buried under the flow.
The island nation has dozens of active volcanoes, but populated areas are rarely impacted by the seismic activity.
"This is people's lives and their homes, and this has the potential to really affect people for the next generations as well. So everyone's taking this very, very seriously and encouraging others to do the same," Ms Langridge said.
A police officer inspects the crack that has opened in the town of Grindavik.(Reuters: Marko Djurica)
Grindavik is on the south coast of Iceland's Reykjanes Peninsula which is where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet.
It's about 50km from the capital, Reykjavik.
While the area has a history of volcanic activity, there hadn't been any eruptions for about 800 years until a minor event in 2019.
But the current situation represents a significant escalation.
According to geophysicist Páll Einarsson, the region has "come to life".
"We have not had an eruption in this part of the country since 1240 in the Middle Ages, and so the modern society that we have here now was built up during a very quiet period," Professor Einarsson said.
"We don't really know what's ahead, but we have to expect that we are beginning an active period in this part of the country.
"What is happening today and maybe the next two weeks is only one chapter in this story and we really expect there to be more."
Geophysicist Páll Einarsson has been monitoring the volcanic activity.(ABC News: Tom Joyner)
The Icelandic Meteorological Office first registered signs of renewed seismic activity in the area late last month.
Several earthquakes struck the town in the weeks that followed, including a magnitude-4.8 earthquake on November 9.
The next day, Grindavik was evacuated and The Blue Lagoon — one of the country's most famous tourist attractions — was closed.
Icelandic authorities are working on a plan to protect the town from potential lava flows and have been constructing an asphalt wall to direct molten rock away from critical infrastructure.
A major focus has been on building defences around the Svartsengi geothermal power plant, which provides electricity to everywhere except the capital.
The frequency and severity of tremors have decreased significantly over the past week, which Professor Einarsson said suggests the rising magma may soon break through the crust.
"We have already seen all of the warning signs, so the warning is there and the next thing that we will see is just molten rock coming to the surface and start flowing around," he said.
But despite the clear warning signs, he admits it's almost impossible to predict exactly when, where and if an eruption will occur.
"All this 15-kilometre crack in the crust is active, so the eruption could break out any place on that stretch," he said.
"We can issue warnings before an eruption comes up, we have quite good success in that, but then on how long it's going to last, how big it is and what is going to happen next month, we can't really tell."
Iceland is no stranger to volcanic eruptions, but the latest activity has people on edge.(ABC News: Tom Joyner)
Last week, more than 3,000 residents were given just two hours to pack and leave their homes amid warnings an eruption was imminent.
Since then, carpenter Hans Vela and his wife Sólveig Thorbergsdóttir have been camping out in a friend's basement.
He doesn't think his family will return to Grindavik, even if their house withstands an eruption.
"Are you going to be there and maybe wait for the next event that is maybe going to be even bigger, because they say it's maybe the beginning of a period of maybe 30, 40, 50 years of activity?
"In that way, I'd rather see lava go over our house, too, because then we don't have to calculate in our head whether it's worth it or not."
Sólveig Thorbergsdóttir and Hans Vela are not sure if they'll return to the town.(ABC News: Tom Joyner)
The pair were living in the town with their children and young grandchild and described the "constant" earthquakes in recent weeks as feeling "like a car hitting the house".
"You see all these photos afterwards, of the roads breaking open and you know you've been driving there and walking there for so many years and it's so absurd and unrealistic," Mr Vera said.
"It's like it's a movie or something, like a disaster movie."
The anxious wait for the predicted eruption is "the worst feeling" for Ms Thorbergsdóttir who said they "would never have imagined" being in this situation.
For three days they've joined the hours-long queue of cars that stretches along one of two roads into the evacuation zone, hoping to return for five minutes to collect their belongings.
"It's like reality TV, you know, you're in front of a house, you have 5 minutes, your time starts, it's crazy," Mr Vera said.
"Life is about relations with your family and your friends and your environment and that's what keeps you going.
"We have our memories, even if our house goes under the lava."
Some of Iceland's most famous attractions have been closed to the threat of an eruption.(ABC News: Tom Joyner)
