The Volcanological Institute of the Canary Islands (Involcan) has registered a swarm of 350 low-magnitude earthquakes this morning (Tuesday), located under the El Teide volcano, however, this does not imply a greater probability of an eruption anytime soon.
Involcan reported on its social media feed that the Canarian Seismic Network identified at least 350 small seismic events between 5am and 9am, meaning that 630 have been recorded in the last few days.
The most likely origin of this type of swarm is the underground movement of steam, gas, or water inside the hydrothermal system of the volcano. This type of activity has characteristics very similar to those that were recorded in Tenerife on October 2nd 2016, June 14th 2019, and June 10th this year.
The IGN says that a series of this type of swarm has been recorded on numerous occasions in the area, the first time in recent history were the signals recorded in 1980 when there was a series of micro-seismicity in Las Cañadas, which demonstrated that this type of activity could be recurrent.
Seismic activity recorded at Teide by the IGN in the last three days
As explained by Involcan, the high detectability of the Canary Islands Seismic Network of the IGN currently allows the detection and localization of this activity related to processes within the Teide-Pico Viejo complex.
The IGN says that this activity indicates a readjustment of pressures in the lower part of the crust due to the volcanic nature of the insular building and the magmatic processes in depth.
They also state that this type of activity is expected in active volcanic islands, and may remain at that depth, or may give rise to shallower seismic activity in the future, without this pointing to an eruptive process in the near future.
They also explained how the activity is detected, saying: “It begins with the recording of a long-duration signal, without defined seismic phases, but with high-frequency content, subsequently giving way to a long series of hundreds of events of small and similar magnitude, that occur at almost regular intervals very similar to a drum beat.”
