These are some messages received during the worst period, when we really thought the station was going to be shut.
Dear volcano-listees,
(...) I would also like to create further attention regarding the evident prospects of having the seismic monitoring by scientists from Udine, Italy, cancelled (see Roberto Carniel's 6 May e-mail message). For many years prior to 1989 (the year when the summit seismic station was installed) I have been wondering about the lack of continuous monitoring of this volcano. It would be tragic to drop back to this state, especially now as there are speculations about an imminent larger-scale eruption of that volcano (see Blot's article on Carniel's Stromboli WWW page).
My personal impression during my 20 April 1995 summit visit was that the volcano was quieter than I had ever seen it before. There were eruptions occurring from two vents in Crater 3 (in the south-western part of the crater terrace) but almost no activity occurred from the numerous vents in Crater 3 where, during my previous visit to the summit, in August 1994, there had been no less than six erupting vents. This inactivity had apparently triggered the widely publicized alarm and prohibition of access to the summit precisely at the time I was there. In my personal opinion, there was little to suspect that something great was to come. The low level of activity alone did not make it, as I thought. Stromboli is ALWAYS dangerous. It has had large eruptions after periods of both low and high level activity. The catastrophic 1930 eruption was not preceded by a quiet period like the recent one. There were apparently no premonitory signs that would have warned of the violent explosions of 11 September 1930; neither were any noticed before a very similar, and equally destructive, eruption in 1919. On the other hand, Stromboli has had other quiet intervals -- even much quieter than this time -- like in 1907-1910, and there were no particularly large eruptions ending the quiet. Indeed, still during my April 1995 stay on Stromboli, on the 23rd, spectacular lava fountaining resumed from a vent in Crater 1, marking the return to more normal conditions. Of course, I don't know if this vent has since ceased again erupting...
I must emphasize that this does not mean at all that I consider the risk at Stromboli insignificant. As written above, I believe that Stromboli is continuously potentially dangerous (and there is no reason to assume that it won't repeat its 1919 and 1930 behavior in the future). And even though I find it highly pleasant to climb that volcano and stay on the summit, I acknowledge that I am taking the risk of being injured or even killed. Eruptions of a much smaller scale than those 1919 and 1930 can be lethal at Pizzo sopra la Fossa. Many other people apparently don't realize that there is this risk, and some even told me "But how can you be that discouraging?" when I told them that it IS dangerous to stay on the summit.
All in all, there is an immense need to continue, if not to improve, the monitoring of Stromboli. This is not only because -- I say the third time now -- the volcano is potentially dangerous not only to those staying on the summit, but also because it is one of the few volcanoes that erupt quasi-continuously since millennia (the quiet interval of 1907-1910 being one of the rare interruptions), and surely much will have to be done to understand why it does so while most other volcanoes don't.
With this collection of images (which will continue to grow during the next couple of days) I express my concern about the imminent shut-down of the seismic station and wish to arouse more interest in this unique volcano, its fascination and its problems. (...)
With TANTI AUGURI (for a good outcome) to the colleagues at Udine, and greetings to everybody else,
Boris Behncke (bbehncke@geomar.de)
Anche da parte del mio amico e collega Benedetto De Vivo desidero esprimervi la nostra solidarieta' e farti i complimenti per la vostra attivita' a Stromboli e per avere impiantato un sito WWW. Spero anche che la pubblicita' che giustamente cercate di farvi possa servire a smuovere un poco la logica con cui si muove il GNV e a farvi avere i finanziamenti di cui avete bisogno.
Coi migliori auguri,
Massimo Cortini - Dip. Geofisica e Vulcanologia - Univ. Napoli
Stromboli seismic station and on-line data via the Internet:
I am a Geography teacher at a Swiss Kantonsschule (selective secondary school, top 20% ability range). I am impressed by Dr. Carniel's work on Stromboli and his near-online seismic data from the volcano. I have already used this data in teaching situations, as well as to demonstrate to fellow teachers the great potential of the World Wide Web for science education.
Stromboli, in many ways, is a model volcano. When teaching about vulcanology or the geography of Italy, always show my own slides and measurements taken on many visits to the island. Dr. Carniel's page adds new dimension to this: we can now observe how the volcano behaves in close to real time. In other words teachers and pupils can "log in" to an active volcano.
It would be most unfortunate if this service were discontinued due to lack of funding.
Dr. Juerg Alean, Rheinstrasse 6, CH-8193 Eglisau, Switzerland, E-mail: alean@access.ch