Road worker plunges into huge crack in Earth that split open during Iceland volcano eruption as frantic search launched
A MAN has plunged into a giant crack in Earth that split open after a volcano erupted in Iceland last month.
The road worker was filling crevasses formed by earthquakes and volcanic activity in the town of Grindavik before he fell into the abyss.
Hundreds of people have been searching for him since Wednesday, but they were forced to call it quits soon before midnight on Thursday due to a rockfall, reports.
"At midnight, we had to stop the search because we could not guarantee the safety of those who were working down in the crevasse," Ulfar Ludviksson, the police chief in South Iceland, told local media.
"There was a rockfall at the top."
According to reports, work was being done to expand the opening of the tiny crevasse, which could only fit two people at a time.
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On Thursday, Mr Ludviksson told Icelandic state TV RUV that the situation was "very difficult and demanding."
"It's deep down. This runs tens of metres down to the bottom. There is water far below this work area where rescuers are working," he said.
He explained that it was uncertain how deep the crack ran, and that the search had to be meticulously organised to guarantee that no one else fell in.
"There are two men who go down in a basket and stay down for about 10 minutes. Then they come up and the other two take over."
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They are yet to find the missing man.
"We came to search until we find him," Mr Ludviksson told Icelandic newspaper Morgunbladid.
It comes after the Grindavik volcano in Iceland erupted last month sending molten lava spewing into the sky.
The town sits near the path of a 9.3-mile-long vertical magma intrusion in the Earth's crust.
Footage showed the moment the volcano blasts as the dark sky is lit up in a fiery red with showers of smoke and blinding lights take over the Reykjanes peninsula.
Sitting near Iceland's capital of Reykjavik, the eruption came after the area recorded thousands of earthquakes in the weeks prior.
The eruption was confirmed by Iceland's Meteorological Office, marking the volcano's fourth eruption in just two years.
Iceland is seen as a seismic and volcanic hot spot as the two plates - Eurasian and North American - move in opposite directions.
The country declared a state of emergency after recent concerns increased, with the UK foreign office warning that "no travel can be guaranteed safe".
An evacuation effort had already taken place in recent days that saw nearly 4,000 people moved out of the fishing town of Grindavik in the country's southwest.
Iceland's president, Guðni Thorlacius Jóhannesson, said at the time: "It is not clear what damage it can cause, but now we rely on our scientists as well as all those who need to do monitoring and other operations.
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"Above all else, we protect human life but we do all the defence of structures to the best of our ability."
Inhabitants of Grindavik described being whisked from their homes as the ground shook, roads cracked and buildings suffered structural damage in a recent devastating spell of bad weather.
