Öskjuvatn (, "Askja Lake") is a

lake A lake is often a naturally occurring, relatively large and fixed body of water on or near the Earth's surface. It is localized in a basin or interconnected basins surrounded by dry land. Lakes lie completely on land and are separate from ...

in the

Highlands of Iceland The Highland (Icelandic language, Icelandic: ''Hálendið)'' or The Central Highland is an area that comprises much of the interior land of Iceland. The Highland is situated above and is mostly uninhabitable. The soil is primarily volcanic as ...

. Its surface area is about 11 km². With a depth of , it is the second-deepest lake in

Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...

after

Jökulsárlón Jökulsárlón (; translates to "glacial river lagoon") is a large glacial lake in southern part of Vatnajökull National Park, Iceland. Situated at the head of the Breiðamerkurjökull glacier, it developed into a lake after the glacier started r ...

. The lake is situated in the

crater A crater is a landform consisting of a hole or depression (geology), depression on a planetary surface, usually caused either by an object hitting the surface, or by geological activity on the planet. A crater has classically been described ...

of the

volcano A volcano is commonly defined as a vent or fissure in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most oft ...

Askja Askja () is an active volcano situated in a remote part of the central highlands of Iceland. The name Askja refers to a complex of nested calderas within the surrounding Dyngjufjöll mountains, which rise to , ''askja'' meaning ''box'' or ' ...

in the northeast of the glacier

Vatnajökull Vatnajökull ( Icelandic pronunciation: , literally "Glacier of Lakes"; sometimes translated as Vatna Glacier in English) is the largest and most voluminous ice cap in Iceland, and the second largest in area in Europe after the Severny Island i ...

. The name ''Öskjuvatn'' simply means ''Askja lake''. Like the neighbouring crater Víti, it was created by an enormous volcanic eruption in 1875.

History

The lake was first surveyed in 1876 by Professor Johnstrup and Lieutenant Caroc. It was roughly circular with a diameter of about 4000 feet (1220 m) and below the floor of Askja caldera. Its water was light-green, and covered from recently erupted

pumice Pumice (), called pumicite in its powdered or dust form, is a volcanic rock that consists of extremely vesicular rough-textured volcanic glass, which may or may not contain crystals. It is typically light-colored. Scoria is another vesicula ...

, at the temperature of . In 1878 the lake was about below the Askja caldera floor, (8 km) in circumference and at a temperature of . In 1881 the lake temperature was down . In 1884 the lake temperature was down , the northwestern length of the lake was and the lake was below the floor of Askja caldera. KnebelRudloffMonument-pjt

On July 10, 1907, two German scientists, Walter von Knebel and Max Rudloff disappeared while exploring the lake in a small boat. The lake was described at the time as almost rectangular and about and below the floor of Askja caldera. Knebel's fiancée, Ina von Grumbkow, led an expedition in search of them with a vulcanologist

Hans Reck Hans Gottfried Reck (24 January 1886 – 4 August 1937) was a German volcanologist and paleontologist. In 1913 he was the first to discover an ancient skeleton of a human in the Olduvai Gorge, in what is now Tanzania. He collaborated with Lo ...

, but no trace of them was ever found. Suppositions at the time suggested that seismic volcanic disturbances could have caused a landslip or similar occurrence, and recorded that only two days previously the telegraph cable to Iceland had been broken by deep water disturbances for the first time since it was laid, close to the Icelandic coast. Reck's 1908 measurements were a mean lake temperature of , dimensions of , no change in surface height, and a depth of more than . In 1917 the lake surface was found to be above sea level, with a temperature of . Hans Reck visited again in 1932 and noted the lakes shape had changed following previous eruptions. There were other eruptions before the first full

bathymetry Bathymetry (; ) is the study of underwater depth of ocean floors ('' seabed topography''), river floors, or lake floors. In other words, bathymetry is the underwater equivalent to hypsometry or topography. The first recorded evidence of wate ...

in 1963. The maximum depth of was possibly greater in a 2012 survey but temperature corrections precluded an accurate figure. What is known is that the lake floor has subsided since 1876.

References

External links

Photo of Askja and the lake
{{DEFAULTSORT:Oskjuvatn Calderas of Iceland Lakes of Iceland North Volcanic Zone of Iceland Volcanic crater lakes

History

See also

References

External links