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Volcano tourism: a reflection from an IAVCEI working group

Alessandro Bonforte 1, Patrick Allard2, Alvaro Amigo Ramos3, Willy Aspinall4, Sara Barsotti5, Costanza Bonadonna6, Richard Bretton4, Salvatore Caffo7, Marta Calvache8, Patricia Erfurt9, Nico Fournier10, Nobuo Geshi11, Hendra Gunawan12, Andrew Harris13, Jeff Hungerford14, Ulrich Kueppers15, Setsuya Nakada16, Chris Newhall17, Joao Carlos Nunes18, John Pallister19, Joali Paredes Marino20, Jon Procter21, Marcel Sorhaburu Alcocer22, Stephen Sparks4, Sulistiyani23

  • Affiliations: 1.      INGV - Osservatorio Etneo, Italy 2.      IPGP, France 3.      Sernageomin,Chile 4.      University of Bristol, UK 5.      IMO, Iceland 6.      University of Geneva, Switzerland 7.      Parco dell\'Etna, Italy 8.      Colombian Geological Survey, Colombia 9.      Geotourism Australia, Australia 10.  GNS, New Zealand 11.  Kyushu University, Department of Earth and Planetary Science, Japan 12.  Center for Volc. and Geol. Haz. Mitigation, Indonesia 13.  Université Clermont Auvergne, France 14.  Yellowstone Park, US 15.  LMU Munchen, Germany 16.  Nat. Inst. for Earth Sc. and Disaster Resilience, Japan 17.  Earth Observatory of Singapore, Singapore 18.  Azores University, Portugal 19.  USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory, US 20.  University of Auckland , New Zealand 21.  Massey University, New Zealand 22.  Universidad de la Frontera, Chile 23.  Geological Agency of Indonesia, Indonesia

  • Presentation type: Poster

  • Presentation time: Monday 16:30 - 18:30, Room Poster Hall

  • Poster Board Number: 114

  • Programme No: 7.2.26

  • Theme 7 > Session 2

Abstract

In recent decades, volcano tourism has become very popular including visits to active, dormant, and extinct volcanoes. As more people visit volcanoes, the risks associated with these areas also increase. To attract visitors, tourist operators offer a diversity of tours with varying degrees of difficulty and risk. The most popular attractions include visits to glowing lava flows and fumarolic areas, as well as observing mildly explosive eruptions.  The commonality between all visiting options is that many people, sometimes involving multiple and diverse groups, may be exposed to the same volcanic hazard and that individual tourist risk can be very different from the societal risk based on multiple group visits. While individual risk is related to the exposure time of an individual, societal risk is related to the total numbers of visitors, the number of groups and the summations of exposure times. The difference between individual and societal risk can be large with major implications and associated potential decisions. In order to improve communication and awareness of environmental volcanic hazards, related risks recommendations, IAVCEI can provide the public with a collection of best practices and protocols to be checked before planning and embarking on a tour. This aim is to complement existing communication protocols established in each country, without interfering with them. In addition, IAVCEI may foster interactions with tourism agencies to support effective risk management and improve information dissemination, starting from the role of the volcanologists and volcanological observatories.