Volcano Cowboys

Not every nerd career takes place entirely behind a flickering CRT. Ellen Knowlton Wilson takes a peek here at a book which exposes one of the hotter fields for those with a nose for sulfur, feet like leather, and a penchant for scientific danger: studying volcanos.

Volcano Cowboys: The Rocky Evolution of a Dangerous Science author Dick Thompson pages 326 publisher Thomas Dunne Books, St. Martin's Press rating 6.5 reviewer Ellen Knowlton Wilson ISBN 0-312-20881-2 summary A story about the evolution of a scientific goal, the prediction of explosive volcanic eruptions

Volcano Cowboys: The Rocky Evolution of a Dangerous Science begins a year before the 1980 eruption of Washington's Mount St. Helens volcano, and attempts to chronicle major developments in the field of eruption prediction over the next decade. This is done in an engaging manner, aimed toward the general reader. Thompson's many years of experience as a science writer for Time prepared him well for the writing of his first book. In the introduction he writes, "This is a book about how science operates. It is the story of how one scientific goal, the prediction of explosive eruptions, evolved during its most intense and productive periods, from the eruptions of Mount St. Helen to the cataclysm of Mount Pinatubo."

The book is divided into three parts. The first part covers the most well-known eruption of recent times in the U.S. -- the May 18, 1980, eruption of Mount St. Helens. The second portion covers the almost ten years from Mount St. Helens' main event to the explosive eruptions of Mount Pinatubo in the Phillipines, and the final part covers the response to activity at Mount Pinatubo in 1991.

The May 18, 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens did not catch volcanologists entirely by surprise. In 1978, two geologists working for the United States Geological Survey, Dwight "Rocky" Crandall and Donal Mullineaux, published a report calling St. Helens "an especially dangerous volcano." After an initial flurry of panic by Washington state residents, not much was done to prepare for an eruption.

On March 20, 1980, a magnitude 4.2 earthquake was detected near Mount St. Helens. Originally, the scientists at the University of Washington who ran the seismic network felt the quake was associated with Mt. Hood, a volcano to the south of St. Helens. Arrival times were punched onto cards and run through the computer, revealing a surprise -- the event had originated directly under Mount St. Helens. The next day, UW scientists installed several seismographs on the restless volcano, which had previously been unmonitored. On Monday, March 24, Steve Malone, a seismologist at UW, contacted the U.S. Geological Survey in Denver.

Soon scientists from various branches of the USGS began to arrive in Washington to help monitor the eruption, but there was little precedent or organization, and tensions quickly rose. Thompson covers the details of the difficulties of coordinating a response to an eruption in a populated area with multiple agencies holding jurisdiction.

In part two of the book, Thompson covers developments in volcanology and eruption prediction between the May 18 Mount St. Helens eruption and the buildup of activity at Mount Pinatubo in the Phillipines. This section of the book is short, but important, since part three, which covers the response to the 1991 eruption of Pinatubo, is largly presented in contrast to the 1980 St. Helens response and thus relies on both preceding sections.

Part three, the response to the 1991 Pinatubo eruption, focuses on the team of "trained decision makers" that had evolved from events of the past. Many scientists involved in the 1980 St. Helens response were also involved in the 1991 Pinatubo response. Advances in technology were essential to the Pinatubo response as well. Some of Thompson's finest writing is in the final section of the book, where he allows more of the personal character of some scientists to shine through (and what volcanologists lack in common sense they often make up for in character.)

Overall, the book is an enjoyable one. I found a few small flaws -- a few sentences that must have slipped past a tired editor, a few incorrect details that I spotted only because I've worked with some of the people mentioned in the book. Having spent entirely too much time in my academic career thinking about volcanoes, particularly Mount St. Helens and Pinatubo, I am probably biased by my background into rating it slightly lower than it deserves.

There is plenty within its pages to fascinate all sorts of geeks. Aside from the obvious appeal of explosions and hot molten magma, there is some discussion of the hardware requirements for volcano monitoring -- can your Linux box withstand a pyroclastic flow? What sort of monitoring software can be designed to run on the only computer in a small Central American town on the flanks of a volcano? Food for thought ...

Table of Contents

Introduction
Part I: Mount St. Helens, 1980
1. Hoblitt's Floating Island, Summer 1979
2. Disbelief
3. The Musketeers
4. The Bulge
Field Notes: May 17, 1980/Mindy Brugman
5. Swanson
Field Notes: May 18, 1980/The St. Helens Observers
Part II: The Learning Season, 1980-1989
Field Notes: August 1980/The FPP Experiment
6. The Volcano Lab: St. Helens After the Blast
7. Mammoth Lakes: Between a Rock and a Hard Place
8. The Volcano Zoo
9. After Armero
Field Notes: December 15, 1989/Redoubt, Alaska
Part III: Mount Pinatubo, 1991
10. Trained Decision Makers
11. They'll Think You're a Hero
12. Eruption
Field Notes: August 1991/Bezymianny
Notes
Glossary
Acknowledgements
Index

Purchase this book at ThinkGeek. And if you enjoyed this review, check out Ellen Knowlton Wilson's page.

Comments

Geology now a digital science

[peter303]

The romance of geological field work in remote and exciting places is pretty much history save for a few lucky geologists. Most geology is now these days. Much volcanology is done with seismic sensors or radar topographic maps that done in front of a CRT. Geoscientists put sensors out in orbit or on ships, collect and analyze as much data as current computer systems allow- about five terabytes for a typical oil prospect. VOlcanoes are monitored with seismic sensors and very sensitive satellite radar topographic maps.

As a rock-jock turned tech-head

[LauraLolly]

My response to this book is "Cool! Glad to see someone covered this hot topic." At most, even field geologists spend just one or two seasons a year doing field work, unless they are stuck at a well analyzing drill cores.

I got my start in tech-land many years ago on a VAX 11-780 trying to create models of soil-slump and mudslides. I then had to alter those models to try to predict pyroclastic (volcanic mud)flows. Since this was during the oil bust of the mid-80's, and geologists without a PhD were earning squat, I became a tech.

Every nerd career involves working with a computer, even if it's just checking email to see what the latest response is to your paper. Geologists are lucky enough to be paid to do much of their work outdoors, but we still can't do squat without adequate models. (Models!=legos, although I have done some great examples of flows with maple syrup.)

Modeling is all about the numbers, and the better your box, and your model, the better your prediction. Fieldwork may be measured in cases of beer, but time out of the field uses the same tool everyone else uses. BTW, Linux World had a great article a couple of months back on visual modeling of meteorological datapoints. Can't find the reference.