Volcano monitoring. Image courtesy of the USGS. Last night I had
the opportunity to see a talk given by YVO Scientist-in-Charge
Dr. Jake Lowenstern as part of the Volcanological Society of
Sacramento meeting and he gave a great talk on the state of
volcano monitoring today in the U.S. He laid out a lot of
details concerning the Volcano Hazards Program of the USGS and I
thought I'd share some of them so we can all have an idea of the
ups and downs of the VHP these days. First off, nothing says fun
like the U.S. Volcano Status Map! Apparently the dreaded watch
"eye" was not meant to be a permanent icon, but hey, it has been
there for years now, so the "eye" may be here to stay. The VHP
was set up via the Stafford Act to monitoring and mitigation
volcanic eruption. Its budget is ~$23 million out of the annual
U.S. Federal Budget (so, roughly 0.0012%). This covers the five
volcano observatories (Alaska, Cascades, Hawai'i, Long Valley
and Yellowstone) along with scientists in the program at the
USGS Menlo Park off