A Book Review on No Apparent Danger by Victoria Bruce

The book of Victoria Bruce No Apparent Danger talks about the continuous hazards brought about by volcanic eruptions even to experts, who were supposed to know the dangers of volcanic activities. Also, the book infers the somewhat rival between scientists because of jealousy. As a result, information is not always shared by scientists such as seismologists and gas chemists. The reason behind death tolls such as those of the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelee in Martinique and 1985 eruption of Nevado Del Ruiz in Columbia that killed 28,000 and 25,000 people respectively was accounted to poor planning and lack of response by the residents that choose to be unaware. However, the book explained that not only the uninformed are affected by volcanic hazards. Since 1947, at least 32 volcanologists have been killed in the field. After years of researches and studies, is volcanology still a poorly understood field, or is it because of the hard-headed scientists who choose to take risks for their personal ambitions The 1985 Nevado Del Ruiz disaster, which caused high death tolls because of the mudflows in the eruption, should have been prevented as explained in the book if only the authorities conducted warnings and hazard-zone map to residents. This event and other volcanic tragedies led to the meeting organized by the international group of scientists in Pasto, Columbia, at the foot of Galeras Volcano. The volcano seemed to be quiet at one time of the workshops field trips that prompted the 14 scientists, led by Stanley Williams, to go down the caldera and examine the gases the emanating from the cone. Without notice, a small explosion ended the lives of the 6 scientists, while others were rescued. The book critiqued the action of the scientists and Williams, and questioned why they have not evaluated first the dangers of the site and raised the issue of competition and professional jealousy among scientists. Two weeks before the deadly event, a long-period seismic event or tornillos was observed, which were thought to be the cause of the small eruption. However, rivalry between concepts of scientists clashed as the seismologists predicted an eruption due to the tornillos, while gas chemists predicted a low possibility of an eruption due to the low sulfur dioxide emission. The author did few judgments to the subjects as to let the reader conclude. The author feared and believed that judgments of scientists are sometimes biased to promote their own field methods while ignoring others (Bruce 2001).

With the personal ambitions prioritized by some of the scientists, the people or residents near volcanic hazards are greatly affected. The authorities should have a non-biased decision and evaluation on their study of active volcanoes in order to inform the residents ahead of time and give them ample time to evacuate and save what they can of their properties. It has been observed that the authorities are sometimes giving inaccurate measurements and warnings to the residents that result to the decrease in confidence of the people to authorities and ignore their warnings. Scientists should serve as examples in wearing protective measures when in close contact to the volcano the book mentioned that only two of the scientists that died wore hard hats. This may serve as bad example to residents as they may imitate the lack of protective measures of the authorities.

What was interesting in the book was the fact that different concepts of science specifically the ones that deal with volcanology could have different and extreme interpretations that have a large impact on the people. The tornillos theoretically should have served as a warning to the scientists that an explosion might come next. However, due to the incoherent findings of two scientists (gas-chemist and seismologist), a conclusion could not be made since their respective findings were extremely different.