Authorities have evacuated hundreds of tourists from an area north of Iceland's largest glacier amid increased seismic activity around a volcano.

Officials say the evacuation is a precautionary measure. The move follows thousands of tremors in recent days around the country's largest volcano system, Bardarbunga, which is located under Iceland's largest glacier, Vatnajokull.

Roads in the area have been closed over fears an eruption could lead to serious disruption.

An update issued by the Icelandic Met Office on Thursday revealed that earthquakes beneath Bardarbunga continued overnight, with magnitudes up to 3.8. Geologists say the magnitude of the earthquakes has been relatively small

The Vatnajokull National Park is more than 300 kms from the capital Reykjavik and covers 14% of Iceland.

Airlines were warned about the increased seismic activity on Monday. The risk level was raised to 'orange' - the second highest warning grade - on Monday after magma movements were detected around 10 kilometres from the surface. The latest update from the Icelandic Met Office said that while the intense earthquake swarm is continuing, "there are no signs of magma moving to the surface".

In 2010 an ash cloud caused by the eruption of Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano shut down much of Europe's airspace for six days. More than 10 million people were affected.

A video has been released that visualises the recent earthquakes, with different coloured dots representing the different dates between 16th and 20th of August:

Originally posted 11:08am