By Julia Rawlins-Bentham

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados (BGIS) — Disaster emergency officials in Barbados are currently monitoring increased activity, recorded since Saturday, at the Kick ‘em Jenny underwater volcano near Grenada.

Director of the Department of Emergency Management (DEM), Kerry Hinds, gave an assurance that her department was closely assessing the activity and updates would be issued only as necessary.

“We are monitoring the situation, which has been brought to our attention by the Seismic Research Centre of the University of the West Indies in Trinidad,” Hinds stated.

In the interim, she reminded the public that any official advisories on the volcano, if necessary, would be issued through the DEM and or the Barbados Government Information Service.

The National Disaster Management Agency in Grenada is presently collaborating with the Seismic Research Centre to monitor the underwater volcano, which has shown increasing signs of activity since Saturday.

The alert level for the volcano is presently yellow, which means it is restless. However, there are no tsunami watches or warnings in effect for the Caribbean.

The Kick ‘em Jenny volcano was last active in 2015.

IMAGE: Vertically exaggerated SeaBeam image of Kick ’em Jenny and newly identified craters and domes discovered in March 2003. Kick ’em Jenny’s summit occurs adjacent to the crater rim at a depth of ~185 m. The deepest point on Kick ’em Jenny’s crater floor lies at ~264 m depth. The image’s left side is drawn N-S (i.e. N towards the upper left). Tick marks along the margins are at 0.01 degree intervals, a spacing equivalent to 1.8-1.9 km. The distance between Kick ’em Jenny and Kick ’em Jack is about 4 km. Graphic: NOAA and UWI-SRU