Residents of Iceland village near volcano that erupted are allowed to return home

Residents of the small fishing town in Iceland where a volcano erupted this week have been told they can return home

GRINDAVIK, Iceland -- Residents of the small Icelandic fishing village near where a volcano erupted were told Friday they could return home.

The regional police chief said residents, business owners and employees could enter Grindavik beginning Saturday and could stay overnight.

The town of 3,800 near Iceland's main airport was evacuated Nov. 10 when a strong swarm of earthquakes led to cracks and openings in the earth between the town and Sýlingarfell, a small mountain to the north. The volcano finally erupted Monday, spewing semi-molten rock in a spectacular show that lit up the night sky.

Scientists said Thursday that the eruption had stopped, though pressure could start building far beneath it once again. They said the lava flow spread across an area of 3.7 square kilometers (1.4 square miles) on the Reykjanes Peninsula, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) southwest of the capital, Reykjavik.

“The stress that has built up over centuries now has been released by ripping the crust apart. That opens a pathway for the magma that’s coming from below to the surface,” Magnus Tumi Gudmunsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland, said Thursday. "We had this event where magma reached the surface and we had this very quick and powerful eruption, short lived and the lava formed.”