The thing about Eyjafjallajokull is that Iceland is, well, one great big pile of congealed lava. Pahoehoe & Aa. That makes it more of a minor inconvenience, except that Iceland's
Jokulls (glaciers) are prone to discharging a mess of melted glacier water every time they get heated up by the volcano they sit on. No smart Icelander will occupy an outwash valley below one of those. The floods can move stadium-sized rocks like they were feathers. These outbursts have given us the geological term "
jökulhlaup"...or glacier flood. Eyjafjallajokull translates roughly to "Island Mountain Glacier" whick might be better termed "eyjaeldfjallajokull", adding that the mountain is a hottie.
Fortunately, the Icelandic volcanoes simmer, for the most part. They ooze. Mount St. Helens, a typical Cascade Bomb, on the other hand, can't pass gas gracefully, it has to get all colicky and throw a conniption fit in order to clear its throat. All that racket AND melted glaciers.
Iceland's Eldfell volcano decided, the same year my
Boler was built, to try and bomb a fishing port into submission, and the locals ended up hosing the lava flows down, thus improving their Westmanjar harbour with a natural lava breakwater. Residents of the Toutle Valley in Washington state would have been vaporized if they tried that trick.
Small price to pay for inexhaustible geothermal energy, which will make Iceland rich beyond belief in the not too distant future.