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Scientists detected about 300 earthquakes in the area around the Bardarbunga volcano since Tuesday, which could herald an eruption.

The volcano, in the north-west region of Iceland's Vatnajokull glacier, could be set to spew out a huge ash cloud.

Now more than 300 people near to the volcano have been evacuated by the national civil protection agency as a "precautionary" safety measure.

It said: "It cannot be ruled out that the seismic activity in Bardarbunga could lead to a volcanic eruption."

The risk level to the aviation industry has been raised to orange - the second-highest level.

There are fears that an eruption could have similar effects to the Eyjafjallajokull eruption in 2010.

The incident shut down much of Europe's airspace for six days, affecting more than 10 million people and causing travel chaos across Europe.

This was the largest closure of European airspace since World War Two, with losses estimated at between 1.5billion and 2.5billion euros (£1.3-2.2billion).

A warning sign blocks the road to Bardarbunga volcano [REUTERS]

Met Office seismologist Martin Hensch said the risk of any disruptive ash cloud similar to the one in 2010 would depend on how high any ash would be thrown, how much there would be and how fine-grained it would be. 

STV weatherman Sean Batty said the news had come after a "intense swarm of earthquakes", increasing fears Bardarbunga "could be waking from a long sleep" and erupt for the first time since 1910.

However, he added: "There needs to be some caution with Bardarbunga. Even although there may be signs of an awakening it could all go calm again, as it did in September 2010.

“There were numerous earthquakes only for it all to go quiet after that, however, the difference this time is that there have been over a thousand earthquakes in just a few days and some have been higher than three on the Richter Scale."