Lava flow hazard modelling during the 2021 Fagradalsfjall eruption, Iceland: Applications of MrLavaLoba
- 1Nordic Volcanological Center, Institute of Earth Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavík, 102, Iceland
- 2Icelandic Meteorological Office, Reykjavík, 105, Iceland
- 3Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Pisa, 56127, Italy
- 4Department of Geology, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York 14260, USA
- 1Nordic Volcanological Center, Institute of Earth Sciences, University of Iceland, Reykjavík, 102, Iceland
- 2Icelandic Meteorological Office, Reykjavík, 105, Iceland
- 3Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Pisa, 56127, Italy
- 4Department of Geology, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York 14260, USA
Abstract. On March 19, 2021, the first eruption in ca. 800 years took place in Fagradalsfjall on the Reykjanes Peninsula, in the backyard of the capital Reykjavík. This effusive eruption was the most visited eruption in Iceland to date and needed intense lava flow hazard assessment and became a test case for hazard assessment for future eruptions on the Peninsula, which can issue lava into inhabited areas or inundate essential infrastructure.
In this study we documented how lava flow modelling strategies were implemented using the stochastic code MrLavaLoba, evaluating hazards during the 6-month long effusive event. Overall, the purposes were three-fold; (a) Pre-eruption simulation to investigate potential infrastructure at danger for lava flow inundation (b) Syn-eruptive simulations for short-term (two weeks’ time frame) lava flow hazard assessment and (c) Syn-eruptive simulations for long-term hazard assessments (months to years). Furthermore, strategies for lava barrier testing were developed and incorporation of near-real time syn-eruptive topographic models were implemented.
During the crisis the code was updated to increase functionalites such as considering multiple active vents as well as code optimization that led to a substantial decrease in the computational time required for the simulations, speeding up the delivery of final products.
Gro B. M. Pedersen et al.
Status: final response (author comments only)
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RC1: 'Comment on nhess-2022-166', Anonymous Referee #1, 07 Dec 2022
Revision
The paper is a chronological narration of how the software MrLavaLobe was used and modified during the 2021 Fagradalsfjall eruption occurred in the Reykjanes peninsula, Iceland. The manuscript is really interesting, and some sections are also compelling. But the text has some problems. In the manuscript, the authors initially describe the eruption, referring to a work in press, and this description seems a summary of the cited work. Then they describe the software without focusing on input parameters and procedures but describing the functionality with a qualitative approach. Then narrate the eruptive crisis and the results of the software used in real time. Finally, they describe the modification and the improvements to the software that were necessary to communicate with the stakeholders and predict lava inundation in a future eruption. The manuscript is too long and, while reading, the scientific motivations of the work are lost. The manuscript also lacks a clear introduction to the software and this lack impedes a full understanding of the reported improvements if not by reading the original paper and making comparison with this one.
I found the manuscript having a journalistic approach, not suitable for a scientific journal. Otherwise, if the authors intended to publish a technical report about the software improvements due to a real time application, then they should remove the chronological description of the happenings and concentrate on the technical improvements of the software and its application to the 2021 Fagradalsfjall eruption.
I appreciated the paper that is well organized in sections but it is too long and the text gets lost in long explanations that could be summarized and made simpler. Moreover, in the manuscript I found some repeated sentences that authors should eliminate. The English is somewhere not fluent and I requested to rewrote some sentences. Sentences are often too long and dispersive; verbs are somewhere used in the wrong way.
I also found that figures are not correctly cited and in the section 2 a figure or a citation to a figure is missing.
Fig.1a and 1b are never cited in the text, while the paragraphs 2 and 2.1 need reference to figures to understand the geography and the eruptive history. The same occurs for other figures. I suggest inserting in the text the right citations of all the figures by indicating also the figure boxes useful in the text.
I attached the pdf of the manuscript where I put my comments with suggestions and critical points, but the list is not exhaustive. I think that the authors should do an effort to re-reading the manuscript and re-writing the longer and twisted sentences and eliminate repetitions. The authors should also rethink the qualitative setting given to their paper substituting the long descriptive part with short quantitative sentences. For these reasons I suggest a major revision.
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RC2: 'Comment on nhess-2022-166', Anonymous Referee #2, 12 Jan 2023
This paper describes the use of a computer code to simulate lava flows during an eruption. However, the paper is badly written and missing all scientific information that would be expected. The authors should completely rewrite the paper with a focus on what they are doing. They need to describe in a scientific manner what they are doing and how they change the code in different scenarios. In present form the paper cannot be accepted, there are several flaws in their references, where they are used to insinuate that they have information on the eruption, but that information does not exist in those papers. In general, the paper should be turned down in its present form. That said I do also encourage the authors to rewrite the paper and be more scientific in such a way that the reader can reproduce their calculation wishes him to replicate what they have done.
Current version is written in such a way that the scientific community can not be proud of.
The authors should also be more careful how they use references, keeping in mind that a reference does need to have that information that you claim to get from it.
Gro B. M. Pedersen et al.
Gro B. M. Pedersen et al.
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