## 4 Discussion
### Spatial Distribution of Craters and Implications for a Feeding Dike  
The SAR images from Phase 1 suggest that the new Tajogaite cone was already visible on day 7 of the eruption, which is allegedly linked to a dike at depth as inferred by geodetic data [49]. On day 11 of the eruption, the Tajogaite cone was found dissected by five pronounced craters. This allowed us to speculate that the eruption initially was fed by a rather localized finger or conduit connected to the deeper dike, which during the following days of Phase 1, propagated and developed a shallow feeder dike leading to the observed alignment of craters dissecting the cone.  
During Phase 2 of the eruption, this trend was further established, fed by a NW-SE oriented dike. We interpreted the appearance of new craters in the SE at the end of October by further propagation/opening of the underlying dike intrusion. This is also supported by the information from the kymographs, as brief activity of the lava fountains was spotted in the SE flank. A reason for this migration could be attributed to the volcanic edifices load, which can alter the local stress field and thus affect the course of nearby intruding magma [12; 22; 55]. Likewise, migration of the eruption site can also indicate a change in the supply rate [56]. The orientation of the dike feeding the crater row of Phase 1 and 2 is in general agreement with a previously inferred rift zone [27], and with the orientation of the fissures that were active during the 1949 eruption [19].  
In Phase 3, the appearance of new craters in the NE and in the SE coincide with the formation of a pronounced set of fractures striking approximately N-S [57], which is a new azimuthal direction that cuts the prevailing dike trend and hence suggests a change in volcano-tectonic dynamics starting from 28 November 2021. We were also able to identify a new arrangement of craters, which suggests the fractures to be related to the intrusion of a new dike that is oblique with respect to the trends identified in Phase 1 and Phase 2. A number of separated craters developed, together with two eruption vents, one in the north and one in the south of this dike. We conjectured that this last dike is driven by late changes in the stress field, just 2 weeks before the eruption came to an end.  
Observations made at La Palma significantly differed from crater and vent developments analyzed elsewhere. During the 2014 Holuhraun eruption in Bardabunga (Iceland), a gradual development from fissure eruption to venting at isolated craters was observed [15]. Above the feeding dike, the number of active vents decreased from 57 to 10 in the first 5 days of the eruption, explained by the solidification of magma channels with less heat transport due to less activity [15]. In contrast, during the 2021 Tajogaite eruption on La Palma, the number of craters and active vents increased from 1-8 in Phase 1 to 6-11 in Phase 2, and eventually to 18-20 in Phase 3. This might suggest that at Cumbre Vieja, the feeding dike developed multiple paths to the surface, either due to reactivation of existing weakness zones, or due to a complex segmentation of the dike in the presence of a complex stress field, or by other local effects such as material and structural heterogeneities in the newly built cone over the preexisting topography.