Montserrat: Life on the Caribbean’s Most Dangerous Volcano

Exploring a different side of volcanic eruptions- the science they facilitate, the people they displace, and the murky mix of natural disasters and tourism.

Special thanks:
Eric Matt: https://www.instagram.com/ericmattt/
Sun Lea: https://montserratislandtours.com/
Dr. Graham Ryan, MVO
David Lea

Become a channel member to access raw footage and extended tutorials: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcOTVI8YJJud1A6aRYrV4sg/join

📧 Contact Me: hello@aidinrobbins.com
📸 Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/aidinrobbins

Further Reading:
Montserrat Volcano Observatory: https://www.facebook.com/mvoms
John F. Cherry and Krysta Ryzewski- An Archaeological History of Montserrat in the West Indies: https://amzn.to/41Fg7aL
Clive Oppenheimer- Mountains of Fire: The Menace, Meaning, and Magic of Volcanoes: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo205711457.html
Lally Brown- The Volcano, Montserrat and Me: Twenty years with an active volcano: https://amzn.to/41H0LCM

Illustrations:
National Archives: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/20007616
Library of Congress: https://www.loc.gov/item/2022670316/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2022670317/
British Library: https://imagesonline.bl.uk/asset/14372/

Asset

Maps/Graphics:
United Kingdom Hydrographic Office: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Admiralty_Chart_No_254_Montserrat,_Published_1869.jpg
Library of Congress: https://www.loc.gov/resource/g4800.ma001002/?r=-0.046,-0.188,1.111,0.986,0
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016586629/

Documents:
Library of Congress: https://www.loc.gov/item/02013437/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016586628/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016586627/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016586778/
https://www.loc.gov/item/2016586626/

Archival Articles:
Sugar trade: https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-western-flying-post-or-sherborne-a/137539241/
Slave emancipation: https://www.newspapers.com/article/belfast-news-letter/137539278/
Eruption: https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-napa-valley-register/137539357/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-naples-daily-news/137539459/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-times/137539311/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-honolulu-advertiser/137539530/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-atlanta-journal/137539740/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-los-angeles-times/137539774/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-item/137539656/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-atlanta-journal/137539571/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/waterloo-region-record/137539803/

0:00 – Intro
1:34 – The History
5:12 – The Eruption
8:10 – The Aftermath
10:06 – The Science
18:26 – Outro

The links above are affiliate links, from which I gain a small monetary compensation when purchases are made. They help keep the lights on 😉

– [Narrator] This is the smoldering crater and towering unstable lava dome, the Soufrière Hills volcano. And this is what it’s capable of. The once vibrant capital city of the Caribbean island of Montserrat. Today, more than half of the island is an exclusion zone. Entire towns buried in volcanic debris,

Luxury hotels and villas completely abandoned, filled with remnants of lives left behind, coated in ash. This volcano erupted 28 years ago, burying much of the island in debris and displacing two-thirds of its population. But there is so much more to this island’s story. Following the eruption, it’s produced groundbreaking developments in the study

Of volcanoes and the management of their eruptions. It’s a place with beautiful beaches, mountains, and lush jungles filled with biodiversity and archeological mysteries. We came here to meet the scientists keeping a close eye on the volcano, and to share a different side of volcanic eruptions, the science they facilitate, the people they displace,

The murky mix of natural disasters and tourism, and the dynamics of living right next to an active volcano. Starting out with a little mission to find something I’m really excited to see, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the volcano. Check out these petroglyphs. Pretty wild. Archeologists believe these were carved somewhere between 1,000 and 1,500 years ago, that they were almost certainly used for some kind of ritual

Or spiritual purpose, and that it’s quite possible, if not probable, that there are plenty more of these in the surrounding areas and on the island as a whole, just kind of hiding behind more vegetation. Montserrat is a part of the Lesser Antilles, a chain of small Caribbean islands lying along a subduction zone

Where the South American tectonic plate is sliding under the Caribbean plate, forming more than a dozen volcanoes. It is also a tiny, tiny island, only about a hundred square kilometers. The southern end of the island, with the current volcanic dome, has more lush volcanic soil. The northern end is more dry and arid.

Archeological evidence suggests that humans first landed on this island about 5,000 years ago, with the first permanent settlement being established about 2,500 years ago. These people likely sailed here from Venezuela. They hunted, fished, farmed, made pottery and maintained complex networks of trade and communication with neighboring islands.

And they gave the island a name, Alliouagana, Land of the Prickly Bush. In 1493, Columbus sailed past this island, the mountainous profile, reminding him of the peaks of Montserrat in Spain. And in 1632, England established the first European settlement here, bringing in hundreds of indentured Irish laborers to farm indigo and tobacco.

Archeological evidence suggests that Caribbean islanders were present on the island during the early years of European settlement and that the two groups interacted. But in the early 1700s, the islanders disappear from Montserrat’s records and are never mentioned again. Within just a couple decades, the colonists started growing sugar.

A wealthy planter class emerged, bringing in African slaves and rapidly deforesting the island’s jungles. By the 1680s, more than two-thirds of the island had been cleared or burned, and by 1768, African slaves made up almost 90% of the island’s population. The 1830s saw the gradual emancipation

Of slaves in the British territories, including Montserrat. Many planters left the island, leaving behind an exploited economy vulnerable to disease and natural disasters and in debt to the British Crown. Montserrat tried and failed to build several new industries, but eventually broke through in the 1850s with the establishment of a lime industry,

Fresh limes, lime juice, lime concentrate, lime oils, pickled limes, lime perfume, lime soap, luxury goods advertised in London, New York, and Shanghai, helping to give the island a nickname it still carries today, rhe emerald a isle of the Caribbean. Montserrat’s fame attracted visitors and throughout the 20th century, it grew into a hotspot

For tourists and wealthy expatriates. And that brings us to the summer of 1995. Montserrat had been devastated by Hurricane Hugo just six years earlier, but recovery efforts were nearing completion. Construction is complete on a shiny new hospital and government headquarters, and there are plans to upgrade the island’s airport as well.

And all of these developments are in the lush southern end of the island in the shadow of its highest peak, the Soufrière Hills volcano. On July 18th, 1995, residents noticed the smell of sulfur in the air. The volcano has begun venting ash and steam. Within days, most shops in the south

Of the island have closed, 1,200 people have left, and others are rushing to banks to withdraw cash. Churches are holding daily prayers. The government is importing supplies and constructing shelters in the north for potential evacuees. Scientists and journalists are flocking to the island and a volcano observatory has been established.

At the start of August, swarms of earthquakes are recorded under the volcano. On August 21st, an explosion sends a cloud of ash into the sky, and at the end of September, a lava dome begins growing near the summit. On December 1st, the capital city of Plymouth is evacuated and a curfew is established.

The next day, a small section of the lava dome collapses and the volcano’s first pyroclastic flow is recorded. A pyroclastic flow is a combination of volcanic gas, ash and rock moving up to 700 kilometers an hour with temperatures up to 1,000 degrees Celsius. Those who have witnessed them often emphasize one

Particularly terrifying quality, their silence. What follows is a three-year escalation of volcanic activity. Earthquakes, explosions and ash clouds become larger and more frequent. The unstable lava dome continuously grows and collapses, spawning larger and faster pyroclastic flows, eventually reaching the ocean and boiling water. As pyroclastic flows flatten and bury entire villages, the evacuated zone grows larger

And the residents of Montserrat are crammed into a smaller and smaller area in the north. The cost of housing and food is through the roof, and more than a thousand people are housed in makeshift shelters. Many are unemployed, relying on food vouchers, and protesters gather at government offices.

Boulders fall from the sky, buildings are set on fire. Ash falls on neighboring islands and Caribbean air traffic is grounded. On June 25th, 1997, a pyroclastic flow buries a section of the main road, destroys nine villages and kills 22 people, farmers working on the volcano’s lower slopes. 90 are rescued, many badly burned

And the airport is closed down. Survivors describe heat like an oven, the air on fire, total blackness like the end of the world, and of course, the silence. On December 26th, 1997, a massive dome collapse causes a sideways explosion of the mountain and a small tsunami, the largest eruption to date.

In 1998, the volcano seems to be quieting down. Growth of the lava dome has slowed. Two-thirds of the population has left the island, but some are starting to return. For the next 12 years, the volcano is fairly restful, with occasional explosions and pyroclastic flows. Much of the island is unrecognizable. Rivers have moved, the coastline has changed shape

And more than half of the forested area has been wiped out. The Soufrière Hills eruption set multiple records, among them. the tallest and fastest growing lava spine ever measured and the highest seismicity ever recorded at a volcano. Today, more than half of the island remains an exclusion zone,

Off limits, unpopulated and filled with ghosts. – You know, while there was lot of devastation, it was exciting as a young person, listening to the seismicity. And you know, you can like look at it just as it exploded through the night and you could see the top go red and then the column goes up, this red column goes up

And then you could see the ballistics kind of glowing and flying out. And then pyroclastic flows start going down the sides and then the lightning and the eruption column and so on. So that was… Yeah, it was quite a spectacular experience. – This is Dr. Graham Ryan, Director of the Montserrat Volcano Observatory.

– [Dr. Ryan] I was interested in science and exact sciences, maths, physics, chemistry, things like that, and I did a degree in physics. And then in the middle of that, this started to erupt. That’s when I got exposure to volcanology. – [Narrator] The volcano has been quiet since 2010, but is continuously monitored

By a team of scientists working here at the observatory and has become one of the most extensively studied volcanoes in the world. – [Interviewer] What’s unique about this particular volcano that warrants such extensive study? – [Dr. Ryan] The eruption’s been quite long-lived, a lot longer than normal, but it’s also been episodic.

There’ve been five phases of eruptive activity. The last phase of eruptive activity ended in 2010. And so we’ve been in this paused state since then. This has been about 13 years. So the question is whether this is a long pause or whether the eruption is over. It’s a small island,

So the population necessarily have to be quite close to the volcano. So it needs to be well-monitored. We have a gas monitoring program, so we look at the gases and the different proportions of different gases, and we have a imaging microwave radar that can see through cloud and ash.

And we have a ground deformation monitoring program where we look at how the surface of the island is deforming slowly in response to what’s happening in the magma chamber and several kilometers below the surface. This is where the seismic data is acquired. So we have seismic stations you can see on the screens.

Each one of those is a data from a different seismometer. It’s a different point on the island. We have cameras all around the volcano, looking at it from different angles in the optical and in thermal as well. But here we have the same seismic data, but on the shorter timescales,

So you can get a clearer picture of what’s happening at any point in time. And then the other thing that this is, this is the communication hub of the observatory. And whenever there’s anybody in Zone V, MVO staff, people doing tours, there’s also sand mining that goes on,

They have to be in communication with the observatory, so that if there is a sudden escalation in activity that’s dangerous, they can give a early warning. We have a weekly report that we put out, a monthly radio program that we do. We have a education and outreach officer,

And we have other kind of more formal semi-annual reports. We have this really well-monitored volcano with a very long set of data. And so there’s a lot to kind of sink your teeth into and kind of understand more about how this volcano and other volcanoes behave and operate. – [Narrator] An early discovery

Was what some scientists described as a volcanic pulse. In May of 1997, the observatory put a tilt meter on the volcano, a device that measures vertical movement. They found a shockingly regular swelling and shrinking of the volcano every six to nine hours, accompanied by a regular schedule of explosions and pyroclastic flows.

– [Dr. Ryan] We were getting explosions every eight hours or so, where we’d see a certain kind of earthquake. There’d be like a drumbeat and then they would get closer and closer and closer in time until they merged together into a tremor. And then you’d have this explosion.

– [Narrator] Because of that predictability of eruptive events, many of the best images of pyroclastic flows were captured on this volcano. – [Interviewer] Has this volcano made any groundbreaking, like new information about volcanoes that weren’t necessarily known before this was studied?

– [Dr. Ryan] I think one of the main things that’s happened here is pioneering different kinds of monitoring techniques. In the early days, you had to do a lot more in-field measurements, and now we’ve developed more, I’d say remote monitoring techniques. So we have instruments out in the field.

We have continuous GPS, continuous gas monitoring. The amount of time that’s necessary to be out making measurements is a lot lower. And we have like an order of magnitude or more data coming in. We still have to go out and fix instruments and keep things going.

And that’s, you know, quite a big task. We still have quite a lot to do, but a lot easier than it was in the past. – [Narrator] The eruption has accelerated scientists’ understanding of Montserrat’s volcanic nature, but also of its ecology and biodiversity. The eruption destroyed more than half

Of the island’s forests, burying habitats for many of its endemic species. The result has been extensive research and protection of the island’s remaining forest as a nature reserve. The eruption also buried many of the island’s archeological sites, further muddying its already mysterious past. – [Interviewer] How might eruptions in the order of hundreds

Or thousands of years ago have affected people populating the island at the time? – Yeah, from the deposits, there’s evidence for eruptive activity about 400 years ago just prior to European colonization. I mean, the Kalinago and Taino people were around in that time, so they probably would’ve witnessed that eruption.

– [Narrator] And finally, recent volcanic activity spawned several new industries, mining of sand and valuable elements from the volcanic deposits, attempts at geothermal energy production, and of course, tourism. – [Interviewer] And do you think there’s a way that like more sides that can be shown to better represent the island, maybe its people,

And just be a better thing for the island as opposed to just strictly like promoting like a dark tourism kind of thing? – Yeah. Montserrat’s a small island. Tourism is an important part of that. And for better or worse, the volcano is a part of that kind of package.

There are lots of different kind of stories. One of the major changes has been a, you know, a massive demographic change associated with the eruptions. A lot of people had to leave ’cause they’ve lost their homes, they lost their jobs. Following that, a lot of people

From around Caribbean started to come to Montserrat, people from Guyana, from the Dominican Republic, later, a lot of people from Haiti, people who’ve come in, you know, midway through the eruption act, and how, you know, kind of what their stories are and things like that. I think that’s quite, quite interesting.

– [Interviewer] What are the current questions that you’re working to answer here? What are the unknowns? – The biggest unknown and I mean, like this is the kind of basic question, is it going to have another, you know, eruptive phase? Every day, we see kind of one or two earthquakes on average.

We still see, you know, hundreds of tons a day of sulfur dioxide coming out and we see ground deformation indicating that that magma storage area is getting pressurized. So we think magma’s coming into it continuously and it’s like filling it like a balloon and pressurizing and those all indicate

That the volcanic system is still active. But we still have to continue looking at that data and looking at different models of how that data can be interpreted. I think one of the things is utilizing this information, better quantifying the hazard and risk associated with it and finding ways of communicating that.

With scientists, we speak a different language than like a politician with. And that kind of bridging that gap is almost a science in itself and like kind of how do you present that data in a way that they can understand it and make sensible decisions with it,

How societies can better prepare and better respond to these kinds of eruptions. – [Interviewer] You’ve worked all over New Zealand, UK, South America, other locations in the Caribbean, but you seem to keep ending up back, working here on Montserrat, studying Soufrière Hills. What is it about this island

And this volcano that keeps drawing you back? – [Dr. Ryan] Yeah, well, I mean like the obvious thing is that I’m from Montserrat. Home always is gonna call you back. But also I’m quite lucky that, I mean, I feel I’m able to make a positive difference here in Montserrat.

It’s a small place so, you know, kind one person can actually kind of make a difference. So I’m kind of lucky that I’m in a position to be able to do that.