CHAPTER 1 VICIOUS VOLCANOES Volcanoes are openings in Earth’s surface Most of the time these openings are closed shut and barely noticeable Then suddenly they can open and shoot out torrents of volcanic ash gases and viciously hot liquid rock Eruptions like these can be violent and spectacular to witness However they can also be devastating causing the tragic loss of many lives and huge amounts of damage and destruction for miles Underground Drama Ingredients for Disaster The drama of a volcano starts deep underground There our planet is in motion and different parts of the rock it is made from push against each other Enormous forces and high temperatures build up from this pushing They cause hot liquid rock under high pressure to move around beneath the surface The easiest places for it to escape the pressure are at the slightest gaps in the outer rocky skin of the Earth It is at these places that volcanoes erupt The bubbling rock called lava that bursts out from within Earth can spill down the sides of a volcano like burning hot syrup or it can shoot into the air like a cork exploding from a bottle of soda The clouds of gas and ash that billow out of a volcano and spread through the air can be hot dense and poisonous Thick lava moves fairly slowly allowing people to escape its path On steep slopes thinner lava can move more quickly making it harder to get away 4
Deadly Explosions The name volcano comes from Roman times when people named a volcanic island Vulcan after their god of fire Soon all volcanoes became known by this name Many volcanoes are indeed characterized by a fiery glow and intense heat as red-hot lava pours out of them burning anything in their paths to cinders They may also spray large chunks of rock splintered from the earth in the explosion into the air These can rain down like deadly missiles A volcano in Russia spews out incredibly hot lava during a nighttime eruption DEADLY DATA The worst volcano ever recorded was Mount Tambora Indonesia in 1815 The lava and superheated gas flows killed many people More people died in the following year because ash clouds blocked the sun and destroyed crops causing famine In total the eruption killed almost 100,000 people 5
Explosive Power Most of the volcanic eruptions that occur are small and happen in volcanoes that are erupting gently most of the time However it is the other volcanoes people have to worry about the rare enormous volcanoes These explode violent blasts of ash gas and lava over nearby land and buildings melting villages in their path Volcano Action It is estimated that across the world at any time there are around 20 volcanoes erupting even right now as you read this sentence Most of these will be small ones that cause minor clouds of ash This ash can form a thin film of dust over cars and homes Most of these eruptions will be unnoticed partly because of their remote locations Every year there are a total of 50 to 70 volcanic eruptions Volcanologists the scientists who study volcanoes believe that there are more than 500 volcanoes around the globe that could go off at some point in the future Vast clouds of heavy hot stinging ash are erupting from a volcano somewhere on Earth right now 6
Studying Volcanoes Volcanologists sometimes need to get dangerously close to volcanoes to study them Volcanologists are interested in knowing more about volcanoes They study the processes involved in their formation and when how and why they erupt They study volcanic eruptions from the past and volcanoes that are erupting gently now They try to figure out what combination of factors collide to result in the biggest most disastrous eruptions Then they try to discover ways of getting better at predicting when a volcano is going to erupt If scientists can predict these eruptions they will be able to give people as much warning as possible so that they can move out of the path of destruction EARTH UNDER ATTACK Volcanologists make new discoveries about volcanoes all the time but it is still very difficult to predict exactly when a volcano will erupt until it is close to exploding Volcanoes are dangerously unpredictable Even volcanoes that have been peaceful for hundreds of years can one day spring to life again 7
