Book review: No Apparent Danger

In 1993 a horrible disaster struck the geology community. On January 14 of that year, 13 volcanologists were on a workshop fieldtrip inside the caldera of Galeras, a volcano in southern Columbia, when it erupted killing 6 of the scientists and 3 local tourists. This tragic event shocked and stunned the geological community. Now, a couple of books have been written about this tragedy.

No Apparent Danger: The True Story of Volcanic Disaster at Galeras and Nevado Del Ruiz written by Victory Bruce has taken a critical look these two volcanic tragedies that struck Columbia.

Victoria writes in a wonderfully easy to read narrative, that grabs your attention from the beginning. She lays out the events of the two volcanic eruptions in the form of a crime scene, where you know the final outcome, but not the events and facts leading up to the crime. She leads the reader through the multitude of facts and eyewitness accounts of these two eruptions to give a clear understanding of what happened, and the mistakes that were made.

The book was inspired by the tragedy at Galeras, but to understand the tragedy there, she takes us back 8 years to the eruption at Nevado del Ruiz that caused a lahar to burry the town of Armero, killing 23,000 people. Here we meet Marta Calvache, a Columbian geologist who plays important roles in both events. Marta and her colleagues are a group of bright, young Columbian scientists who are given the responsibility to interpret the activity at Nevado del Ruiz, a task that they admit is over their heads. The Columbian scientists seek out the best international help they can get to help them interpret the volcano, and do their best to warn the government of the danger the volcano poses. In the end, their dire warnings are ignored, and the most tragic volcanic eruption of the twentieth century occurs.

After Nevado del Ruiz, we jump forward 8 years to follow Marta Calvache and other Columbian scientists to the recently active volcano at Galeras. This time, the Columbians have more knowledge and equipment at their disposal, but tragedy again occurs. Victoria Bruce leads us as a detective would, setting the background of the volcano, its history and the facts about its activity leading up to the mild, but fatal eruption in 1993. She intersperses her narrative with quotes from the scientists who worked on the volcano, as well as those scientists who were in the caldera on the day of the eruption and survived. Her narrative leads the reader through a series of events, piecing together the decisions that led to the tragedy, and how it could have been prevented.

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