Volcanoes - Can We Predict Volcanic Eruptions?

A Volcano is an opening, or rupture, in a planet's surface or crust, which allows hot magma, volcanic ash and gases to escape from below the surface. Volcanoes are generally found where tectonic plates are diverging or converging. Magma is molten rock within the Earth's crust. When magma erupts through the earth's surface it is called lava. 

The map below shows the divergent plate boundaries and recent sub aerial volcanoes.

After I did some online research about volcanoes, I was amazed by the destructive power of mother earth. Every time a volcano erupts, human activities will be interrupted and a great number of economic damage will be caused. It may cause injuries or deaths. 

The questions was raised long time ago: can we predict when a volcano will erupt?


Scientists can often find clues about past eruptions by studying the deposits left behind. Areas affected by lava flows, debris flows, or pyroclastic flows can be mapped, making disaster planning more effective. In addition to these long-range forecasting, scientists are becoming more and more skilled at spotting the warning signs of the eruption. 

Before an eruption, magma moves into the area beneath the volcano and as it comes closer to the surface, the magma releases gases. Animal and bird movements, melting snow-caps, and crate lakes drying up, all these events could be monitored as the warning sign of volcano eruption. However, more efficient and effective detection methods related to the inner workings of an active volcano have been developed. The most common of these instruments are tiltmeters and seismographs that are used to measure the ground swell produced by the strain of the magma pushing its way to the surface before an eruption, as well as the vibrations in the earth. 

As up to today, volcanic eruptions can not be predicted by stochastic methods, but not by catching early symptoms before an eruption. Therefore, continuous monitoring even of dormant volcanoes, though costly, is the only way to enable eruptive behavior forecasts. Many countries operate volcano observations at a lesser level of funding. Volcanic activity prediction has not been perfected, but significant progress has been made in recent decades. I'll keep in touch with the latest progress of volcanic eruption prediction and I'm looking forward to seeing the day when we are able to predict every single volcanic eruption so that we could minimize the loss.