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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Today is world meteorological day #worldmetday 🌦️ DYK that the Icelandic Met Office has an API for weather observations. I´ve been having lots of fun building weather info screens for my new @trmnl.com a brilliant little ePaper info screen Our API: api.vedur.is/weather/ More on TRMNL: trmnl.com

5 highest and lowest temperatures for the past 1 hour

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 17/12/2025

Another milestone for us at Icelandic Met Office 🎉 This week we launched a new site with #avalanche forecasts/conditions, incl. recent avalanches. A major update was required in the background, migrating to #Postgres, building APIs and of course the website handled by our friends at Origo & Metall.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 14/12/2025

Every 3 hrs. we produce 219 tile-sets. This makes up a 3-day forecast with wind, temperature and precipitation and deliver that to our users. Then we rinse and repeat. This pipeline uses @maptiler.bsky.social Engine + Upload API + Cloud + SDK JS with Weather+ with great success and stability.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 14/11/2025

November is my favorite time to look at #Sentinel2 images of Iceland. All the long shadows draw out the landscape is we are just about to hit the dark months in the visual spectrum acquisitions. #iceland #glacier #remotesensing #copernicus

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

Had a great time with MapTiler team at Connect 2025! Truly inspiring to see what is being built and delivered. Also great to get a chance to give positive feedback from us at The Icelandic Met Office

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

Very excited to be part of MapTiler Connect 2025 🤩 We at The Icelandic Met Office together with our friends at Origo have been busy building lots of maps with MapTiler 🗺️ Registration is open for online attendance ✔️

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 13/09/2025

Before and after #flood A pair of #Sentinel2 satellite images acquired on the 20th of August and 8th of September showing the lake where a glacial outburst flood aka #GLOF aka #Jökulhlaup occurred at the margin of #Langjökull glacier. Check previous post for a short video from the field.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 05/09/2025

Throughout #Iceland the Icelandic Met Office operates small web cameras. These are co-located with other equipment like #GNSS and #Seismic stations. They are our eyes in the field. Some capture stunning #nofilter 24h time-lapse like this one looking West towards our old friend #Eyjafjallajokull

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 01/09/2025

A nice #Landsat brightness temperature image from last night (ascending path). Data clipped to a union of all 9 lava outlines with the latest one on the right. Calculated from band 10 (level 1). Hotspots by the main crater and the thickest part of the lava field. #NASA #USGS #Svartsengi #eruption

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 24/08/2025

A few days ago, we had a glacial outburst flood AKA Jökulhlaup. The water originated from an ice dammed lake by Langjökull glacier. The flood did not cause any issues downstream, but its mechanics are interesting since water flows both beneath and on top of the glacier. A short vid from the field 👇

youtu.be

Hafrafellslón - jökulhlaup í ágúst 2025

YouTube video by Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 29/05/2025

In May #Iceland was hit by a significant #heatwave Several stations exceeded 20°C for 10 consecutive days 🔥 New record for maximum May temperature was set on the 15th, 26.6°C 🌡️ This is #EUMETSAT #MTG satellite images for those 10 days at 10 min interval (geo color image) 🛰️ More info in comment👇🏻

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 20/05/2025

Ascending orbits for visual spectrum #satellite images are usually not of interest for most (nighttime images). But for high latitudes in early summer, they can give great results 😍 This is #Landsat9 brightness temperature from band 10 at 22:30 UTC last night over #Iceland Darker is colder 🌡️

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 16/05/2025

More stunning acquisitions by #sentinel3 of #Iceland from today. The last couple of days have been exceptionally warm with many stations showing more than 20°C.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 06/05/2025

This spectacular image of #Iceland was acquired by #Sentinel3 last Saturday. Perfect conditions to hike on top of #Snæfellsjökull glacier with some friends. The latter part of winter was warm and light in terms of snowfall. The April mean temperature was also one of the hottest on record (4/180).

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 04/04/2025

And there we have it. The 8th eruption from the #Svartsengi magma reservoir. By far the smallest one in terms of eruption time, area and volume. Updated lava comparison map that also includes the #Fagradalsfjall eruptions. #Iceland #QGIS #eruption

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 01/04/2025

On helicopter duty this morning 🌋 Collaborative effort 🤝 - Veðurstofa Íslands - Icelandic Met Office - Institute of Earth Sciences, University of Iceland - Icelandic Coast Guard - Iceland Civil Protection #eruption #iceland #grindavik

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

Hello Sentinel-1C 👋🏻🛰️ We have a new #Sentinle1 #SAR satellite delivering data. 1C has joined 1A in orbit and data is now available. Here is an IW mode image from this morning of #Iceland - VV polarization with logarithmic scaling (good for surface roughness). Images from #Copernicus Browser 🙏🏻😍

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

Some field work today with Civil Protection near #Grindavik and #Svartsengi Looking at lava barriers and cleaning some webcam lens covers. Trying to be as prepared as possible for the next one 🌋

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

There are so many nice #QGIS plugins available. Check out Globe Builder. Need an orthographic projection view of your data? Done! These are the different weather forecast models used by The Icelandic Met Office + subsets. IG and DINI are jointly operated with Denmark, Ireland and Netherlands 🤝🏻

A globe map showing areas around Iceland

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 11/03/2025

A nice von Kármán vortex street south of Jan Mayen today 😍🌀🌪️ Image acquired by #Sentinel3 👉🏻 en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%A1...

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 27/02/2025

Hello Sentinel-2C 👋🛰️ Images from the recently launched @esa.int third #Sentinel2 satellite are now available. Some winter wonderland images from #Iceland acquired yesterday over the Northeastern highlands. 📸 Lake Mývatn 📸 Jöklusá á Fjöllum glacier river 📸 Askja volcanic caldera & lake

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 08/02/2025

Very excited to announce early public beta of our new website at The Icelandic Met Office. @maptiler.bsky.social plays a key role in delivering maps for the new site. The weather charts use their Engine + Cloud + Weather SDK with the front-end handled by our friends at #Origo -> gottvedur.is

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 22/01/2025

During volcanic eruptions in #Iceland the scientific community relies on The Icelandic Coast Guard for support during the first phase of events. Their fleet includes a #Bombardier Dash-8 turboprop equipped with a side-looking radar + camera systems. Today we did some training looking at volcanoes.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 15/01/2025

Hi #GISchat 📢 Tomorrow I´ll be leading a #QGIS course for my Met Office coworkers, first group out of 3! Do you have any fun geometry generators for my course? I have a few practical examples but need some funny ones to show that there are no limits (except your imagination).

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

I should perhaps decrease my coffee consumption ☕ Here are the same images with the correct timestamp!

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 09/01/2025

More details in English on the recent #earthquake activity on the #Snæfellsnes peninsula. Data suggests magma intrusion at a considerable depth. No deformation has been observed. en.vedur.is/about-imo/ne...

en.vedur.is

Magmatic intrusion at considerable depth beneath Grjótárvatn likely | News | Icelandic Meteorological office

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 09/01/2025

More thermal infrared images from #Landsat 😍 This image was acquired last night covering NE part of #Iceland Partially clouded but lots of interesting things visible like the geothermal areas near Kverkfjöll and Þeistareykir. Images with and without a hillshade blend. #usgs #nasa #satellite

Thermal infrared image of Iceland with colors going from dark purble to bright yellow.

Thermal infrared image of Iceland with colors going from dark purble to bright yellow with hillshade effect.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 01/01/2025

There is no edit option on Bsky is there? *My annual… **SE to NW…

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 31/12/2024

May annual earthquake map 🎆 Iceland is situated on the Mid Atlantic Ridge making it a very volcanically active. The ridge cuts the island in half from SW to the NE, slowly spreading it a part. Here are all the ~30000 earthquakes that have been verified and checked by the Icelandic Met Office staff

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

The open source geospatial community is here, grab this starter pack 👇🏻

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 20/12/2024

The first lava field from Dec 2023 is now almost fully covered! A simple comparison map showing all the ten lava fields since 2021. Made this as part of very nice overview article (in Icelandic) put together by my very talented colleagues and coworkers (link in reply). All the maps were with #QGIS

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 19/12/2024

Yet another beautiful ascending night-time image from #Landsat looking at the eruption site on #reykjanes peninsula. This is brightness temperature for band 10 (thermal infrared) acquired last night around 22:30. Outline for the most recent lava shown. #USGS #NASA #Iceland

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 07/12/2024

A great example of a suggessful cross agency collaboration! The remote sensing team lead by Joaquín and Birgir has played a key role in delivering important data for monitoring and model inputs for us at Icelandic Met Office. www.gim-international.com/case-study/m...

gim-international.com

Mapping lava flows during volcanic eruptions in Iceland

Rapid aerial photogrammetry with high-precision GNSS georeferencing enables experts to precisely monitor eruptions even under extreme conditions, help...

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 04/12/2024

We at Icelandic Met Office are very excited about the @eumetsat.bsky.social #MTG satellites and the all the various products making their way to the operational phase. Here is a 10-minute interval GeoColour images tracking the volcanic plume from #Reykjanes #eruption during nighttime over 2 days.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 03/12/2024

During winter months we have limited satellite coverage on the visual spectrum. But currently #Landsat satellites are acquiring on ascending paths during night-time over Iceland. The thermal infrared bands sometimes yield spectacular results if cloudless, especially during a volcanic eruption!

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 30/11/2024

Prolonged northerly winds have created ideal conditions for sea ice between #Iceland and #Greenland This is a 2-month series of #Sentinel1 extra wide swath images showing drift ice forming and extending its claws towards the #Westfjords GIF made in a few minutes with #Copernicus browser ❤️

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 29/11/2024

We are now in midst of the 7th #eruption near the Svartsengi power plant. The most cost-effective instrument in monitoring an ongoing eruption is a camera. The Icelandic Met Office deploys quite a few cameras. This is a timelapse from our lates #PTZ camera looking westwards towards the eruption site

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Reposted by Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson

Guðbjörg Ásta Ólafsdóttir @fishiceland.bsky.social · 17/11/2024

Amazing few days seeing the science community assemble on BlueSky 🧪 Follow & share #Iceland based scientists for Fish & Fishers 🐟🎣Oceans🌊 Ecology & Biodiversity🌍🌱 Geology🌋Climate🌡️ Sustainability💚 Habitats🪸 Geography and Mapping🗺️ Community and inclusive methods🏘️ Marine mammals🐳 go.bsky.app/85P7bK8

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 16/11/2024

Four of my favorite #MODIS images of Jan Mayen with a von Kármán vortex streets this year. This phenomenon forms when a steady flow of becomes separated by an obstacle (like a huge stratovolcano in the middle of the ocean) and sheds vortices. Named after the fluid dynamicist Theodore von Kármán.

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Ragnar Heiðar Þrastarson @ragnarheidar.bsky.social · 13/11/2024

Building animations with #QGIS geometry generators. This is GNSS station SENG located east of the Blue Lagoon in Iceland. This animation covers ~5 years and includes multiple eruptive events that have caused significant deformation on all 3 axes, pushing the ground to the west. #eruption #iceland

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