Articles | Volume 24, issue 9
https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-2971-2024
https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-2971-2024
Research article
 | 
04 Sep 2024
Research article |  | 04 Sep 2024

“More poison than words can describe”: what did people die of after the 1783 Laki eruption in Iceland?

Claudia Elisabeth Wieners and Guðmundur Hálfdanarson

Related authors

The interaction of solar radiation modification with Earth system tipping elements
Gideon Futerman, Mira Adhikari, Alistair Duffey, Yuanchao Fan, Jessica Gurevitch, Peter Irvine, and Claudia Wieners
Earth Syst. Dynam., 16, 939–978, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-16-939-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-16-939-2025, 2025
Short summary
Explaining the high skill of reservoir computing methods in El Niño prediction
Francesco Guardamagna, Claudia Wieners, and Henk A. Dijkstra
Nonlin. Processes Geophys., 32, 201–224, https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-32-201-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-32-201-2025, 2025
Short summary
A computationally efficient method to model Stratospheric Aerosol Injection experiments
Jasper de Jong, Daniel Pflüger, Simone Lingbeek, Claudia E. Wieners, Michiel L. J. Baatsen, and René R. Wijngaard
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.22541/essoar.174273333.31930996/v1,https://doi.org/10.22541/essoar.174273333.31930996/v1, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

Balkanski, Y., Menut, L., Garnier, E., Wang, R., Evangeliou, N., Jourdain, S., Eschstruth, C., Vrac, M., and Yiou, P.: Mortality induced by PM2.5 exposure following the 1783 Laki eruption using reconstructed meteorological fields, Sci. Rep.-UK, 8, 15896, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-34228-7, 2018. a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i
Bell, M. L. and Davies, B. L.: Reassessment of the Lethal London Fog of 1952: Novel Indicators of Acute and Chronic Consequences of Acute Exposure to Air Pollution, Environ. Health Persp., 109, 389–394, 2001. a, b, c
Blong, J. R.: Volcanic Hazards, a sourcebook, Academic Press, https://doi.org/10.1016/C2009-0-21853-8, 1984. a, b
Carlsen, H. K., Ilinskaya, E., Baxter, P. J., Schmidt, A., Thorsteinsson, T., Pfeffer, M. A., Barsotti, S., Dominici, F., Finnbjörnsdottir, R. G., Jóhansson, T., Aspelund, T., Gislason, T., Valdimarsdóttir, U., Briem, H., and Gudnason, T.: Increased respiratory morbidity associated with exposure to a mature volcanic plume from a large Icelandic fissure eruption, Nat. Commun., 12, 2161,https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22432-5, 2021a. a
Carlsen, H. K., Valdimarsdóttir, U., Briem, H., Dominici, F., Finnbjörnsdottir, R. G., Jóhansson, T., Aspelund, T., Gislason, T., and Gudnason, T.: Severe volcanic SO2 exposure and respiratory morbidity in the Icelandic population – a register study, Environmental Health, 20, 23, https://doi.org/10.1186/s12940-021-00698-y, 2021b. a
Download
Short summary
After the 1783 Laki eruption, excess mortality in Iceland was one-sixth of the population, traditionally explained by famine due to livestock loss. Since 1970, it has been suggested that 1) fluorine poisoning may have contributed to mortality in Iceland and 2) air pollution might have caused excess deaths in both Iceland and Europe. Reviewing contemporary Icelandic demographic data, air pollution simulations, and medical records on fluorosis, we show that evidence for both hypotheses is weak.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint