Volcanologist

Long Valley Caldera is in central eastern California, essentially at the town of Mammoth Lakes.

We sometimes are being asked if the number of currently active volcanoes and ongoing erruptions, or global volcanic activity, has been increasing recently. Should we be worried "globally"?

The current level of volcanic activity is completely normal, on the contrary (if not on the low end of averages over decades).

The main difference is that there is faster and more information availabe, as well as increased media coverage and public interest on the subject of global volcanic activity. This might give the impression that volcanic activity is on the increase (which it is not).

They are all exciting in their unique ways. I think that two specifically stand out for me, St. Helens and Erebus.

Well, the pilot had to look out for the falling tephra, but mainly he was just worried about flying into 1123 (the hill where volcanologists camped when monitoring Pu`u `O`o) because it was the biggest hill around, except for Pu`u `O`o.

The most difficult thing for me is that I'm a volcanologist at a university. So I don't get to go work on volcanoes unless I raise the money to do so, unless I get a grant from the National Science Foundation. I also have responsibility for teaching and training students, and for doing administration both within the university and within the profession. So there's a big juggling act involved, and while I enjoy most parts of the job, it is often overwhelming to try to do them all at once.

The location of Erebus in Antarctica is amazing, the snow, ice, and rock are beautiful and I think the fact that very few people have ever been there makes it a really special place to work. Also, it is a weird type of volcano and has a lake of molten lava at the summit.

St. Helens is a little different. I grew up close to St. Helens and have been hiking and skiing there since I was very young. So I have had a lifelong relationship with this volcano and I am very attached to it. This makes it a very special place for me.

Well, the job can be physically demanding at times because it's so hot on an active volcano, especially here in Hawaii. And students who are interested in volcanology should be aware that they still have to spend a lot of time indoors staring at a computer. One of the biggest problems for volcanologists is that there aren't enough active volcanoes to go around, so it's hard to find a job.

It is much more difficult to predict the end of an eruption than to predict its beginning. The table below gives the length of time that volcanoes erupt.

Explosive eruptions end when sufficient decompression is attained to cause magma chamber collapse and restoration of the initial pressure conditions.

I have never had any injuries directly related to the volcano. However, every field geologist has had scrapes, cuts, bruises, and assorted sore muscles from their work.

Go for it! There are many different types of careers you can have. You don’t need to be adventurous and like field work, you can be a modeler, but I think that anyone, no matter what they do, should try to experience a volcanic eruption at least once in their life. This is why I wrote “The Volcano Adventure Guide”.

During eruptions that last for long, it’s very hard to spend most of your days working, and being continuously stressed about the terrible consequences of lava invading villages, and to be able to be calm and discuss with the frightened population of the threatened villages. It is also very hard to cope with media during those episodes.

The time I worried the most was at the end of January 1997 when Pu`u `O`o had completely drained leaving a hole 250 by 400 m and at least 250 m deep. I wanted to attempt measuring the depth of that hole, but I had to do it by walking up to the edge of the hole! We got an estimate, but I could never make myself walk right up to the edge.

Volcanic eruptions are not the most dangerous of natural disasters. They cause less fatalities than earthquakes, hurricanes and famines.

In the past 200 years, there have been over 200,000 deaths in volcanic eruptions. Four causes resulted in 91% of the fatalities -

famine and epidemic disease (30%), pyroclastic flows (27%), lahars (17%), and tsunamis (17%).

The scariest volcano experience that I had was also in Antarctica. The first time that I worked on the volcano I was there with a fairly large group of people, including a scientist who wanted to study gases that were coming out of the lava lake. To reach the lava lake, we first had climb down a steep face, using ropes, to reach the main crater floor. The lava lake was in an inner crater, another 3 or 4 hundred feet below that.

Misti is just over 19,000 feet high which is easily the highest volcano that I have ever studied. However, because it is an island and a large part of the volcano is below sea-level Erebus is the overall largest volcano that I have ever studied.

Here's one from Hawaii, and it involved flying in a helicopter, which is one of the more dangerous things that volcanologists do.

I went to Western Washington University for my Bachilors degree, New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology for my Master’s degree and now I am here at University of North Dakota working on my Ph.D. I will be moving to the University of Oregon this Fall to complete my studies.

The fact that it is a continuous challenge. And this challenge involves both my body and my brain. My body because many places are hard to reach, my brain because I never end to learn and to have more curiosities.

Volcanism is a major factor on all of the terrestrial planets, so it has had a huge affect in forming the Earth, Mars, and Venus.

Some volcano eruptions throught history have been significant in their contribution to science. The following volcanoes were significant for their contribution to knowledge about eruptions, or occurred close to large populations.