Volcano Café

Chapter 1 Welcome to Volcanocafe (written by Carl when he started the blog in November 2011)
Chapter 2 Rules
Chapter 3 List of Dragons
Chapter 4 HELP  How to find your way around, what useful things can be found where!
Chapter 5 Explanation of the menu
tbc.

Chapter 1

Photographer Amcaja, released under GNU. Living under a large volcano can be scary sometimes. I have a vacation home next to this 4115 metre baby. It is Mount Fako (Cameroon), the volcano last erupted with a VEI-2 in the year 2000.

Hello everyone!

Starting a new blog is an audacious and scary project. First of all begs the question, what is it all going to be about? This question was the easiest to answer since my interests are volcanoes, tectonics, and geology in the broadest aspect possible. The blogs that are already about in this field are mainly technical and written by expert volcanologists, or geophysicists that write about tectonics and earthquakes.

Among those I have two favorite blogs; one is Dr. Erik Klemettis Eruptions over at Wired Science, http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/eruptions. I would advise anyone interested in things magmatic and volcanic to follow him too. If you are addicted to earthquakes I would like to point to Armand Vervaeck et al, and the ever interesting Earthquake Report, http://earthquake-report.com. The links to those two blogs will be plastered on the side bar of this blog for easy access as soon as I figure out how to do it (most likely someone will have to do it for me).
Why then start a new blog if there are already two outstanding blogs in their respective fields? Well, I think there is more to the story than the technical stuff. The effects of volcanoes and earthquakes are larger than that; they after all affect real human beings, often in tragic ways. So I think that a bit of sociological aspect should be added to the technical issues. They also affect biological systems, so expect some nice posts about biology in and around volcanoes. On top of that we have geology; after all we are talking about the odd world of rocks folks. Also, if we are lucky there will be a bit about risk management and how the scientists work to save lives. And without making any promises, I am hoping that we can snare a volcanologist to give a couple of guest blogs, more on this as that unfolds.

My personal motto is “Nobody is an Island alone”, Erik go at it alone, Armand does it as a group effort. I am a friend of group efforts, they are most often not as stringent as the “man alone” blogs, but in multitude lays strength and diversity. So if you feel that you have a perspective to add to the combined story. Please feel free to put in a suggestion about what you can add to the blog, either as a guest-blogger, or as a permanent blogger. Just remember that different bloggers will have different ways of writing. There are also those that quietly help out with other things in here. I will leave it up to them to do their own presentations. I will though mention the quit help of Ursula who set up this place for us.

Photographer Peter Hamel, released under PD-USGov-NPS. Who could believe that this is the sight of 15 cubc kilometres of magma being released? Novarupta, Valley of ten thousand smokes.

A short note about me and my interest in volcanoes, it all started when I was about 7 and I found a book on volcanoes. I started reading and found an article about Novarupta Eruption in Katmai back in 1912. In a way it shows that young boys are easily impressed by big numbers, after all Novarupta was the largest eruption during the twentieth century. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novarupta

A short note about me would perhaps be in place. I am using Carl le Strange as a nom de guerre. I have a background as a music major (composition), and then realized that I prefer to listen to other peoples music, so I went back to my love of understanding things. After a major in theoretical physics I started working in the military industry at the same time as I did my Ph.D. I think that was more common back then, than it is today. When I was done with my studies (complete with a side trip into another major in literature) I got into the Energy sector, where I stayed for quite some time in various capacities.

Personally I will start with writing posts about all active volcanoes in Europe, starting in the next post in the far far north of Jan Mayen and Berenburg, and then slowly meander south, making ample room for other posts as it is merited and things occur in various places. As eruptions happen I will of course write a bit about them to. With European volcanoes I am afraid that I mean the lot of them, including Azores, the Canaries, and with a disturbing likelihood that I will digress at some point into African volcanoes. I sincerely hope you will like my meandering and slowly whimsical tour of the, ahem, European volcanoes.
One thing I am sure of, you will love the rest of the bloggers!

Blogs have a way of growing, and as they grow they need a bit of rules. I like simplicity. Therefore I think that a good idea would be to have a dedicated thread have a “Friday Science Bar Thread” where people can socialize freely. That way we can keep the dedicated threads nutty, friendly and a fairly on topic. I for one will not mind a few off topic posts here and there, but if a long discussion happens I think it should be moved into the Bar. Obviously insulting and derogatory comments will be removed. Scaremongering and conspirationalist comments will be removed unless they are deemed to be a question that can be answered in such a way that the commenter can be helped into a more scientific point of view. I hope this will be enough for everyone’s needs and likes. If not, feel free to comment the rules at any time. I would also urge everyone to help educate as many people as possible in the way that they feel that they can contribute.

I would here like to say thank you to those that have been quietly badgering me to start blogging about science in general, and volcanoes in specific. There was though one email that really made me decide myself. It was from a mother of 3 children who wrote about how her children and their friends had gotten interested in science due to science blog. So here goes, may the fun begin!
CARL

Chapter 2 Update Friday 13th of July 2012:
A few rules had to be written down:

If quoting from a source, give references and/or a link to where you found it. Do not quote entire pieces, pick the interesting parts only. Make a summary, or phrase it into a question so that we can have a discussion. Think about it, is this something that you wish to discuss? At all times be friendly. This is not the place for abuse or flame-wars. Any intervention by a Moderator/Dragon is to be discussed over email with the list-owner. Posting material of your own work is to give explicit permission to use the before mentioned work within the site. It is up to the will of the site owners and the editors to move or use it is subsequent postings without any further consent than the original posting by the author. Chapter 3 List of Dragons: Spica GeoLurking Kilgharrah schteve42 chryphia El Nathan ancalagontheblack (dfm) Ukviggen Chapter 4 HELP You already found the page with the rules and list of dragon. Help on: How to change your avatar How to add a smiley How to do a video from a streaming webcam How to do a screenshot Where to upload images How to upload a video Plotting for beginners can be found in “Gems without any relation to volcanoes” to be found in the section Gems in the menu. Information on how you can be prepared for a volcanic eruption Icelanders do prepare for Eruptions – A personal observation Author: Islander Chapter 5 Home: Thats the place where all new posts show up and where you end up when you only go to volcanocafe.wordpress.com. This is the most frequented place. ——————— Welcome to Volcanocafe: was posted by Carl when the place first opened, you can find the idea behind all of this there, as well as some rules. NEW Welcome to Volcanocafe now also contains the rules, the list of dragons, HELP and this explanation to the menu. ——————— Dragons Hoard: Treasury got renamed It is a drop down menu, as you see. International treasures: gives a list of vocano observatories outside Europe. Things are being added as they come up. I am not trying to collect all avaiable links worldwide, just those were some  action is going on or is to be expected. Trying to have “all” would require checking tons of links ever so often and i just do not  have the time for this. Archive sorted by date published: selfexplaining Archive sorted by topic: selfexplaining. Again i am not trying to store “all” links but this was designed to help finding older posts, for whatever reason. Wonder what Bob is up to: Gives links, and papers to monitor or understand what is going on around El Hierro better. Wonder what is going on in Iceland: Same as above, but this time with links and papers for Iceland. Wonder whats going on in Santorini: Here you can find links and papers if Santorini should decide to be more active again. Italian Job: Tons of Etna webcams and links to observatories and other pages regarding volcanic action in Italy. ( This page really needs more dedicated work by me ) In case some action starts to happen in some other place, and we on VC watch it closely, another menu point will be added here, so not to overwhelm the other archive pages. ——————— Gems: Another drop down menu, but with only 2 bars at the moment. AlanC´s riddles: A list of Alan´s evil riddles with the winners and answers and the momentary score. This will get a secondary menu as soon as the page gets too long. Sheepy Dalek, Name that Lava: A list with all published Name that Lava riddles, the score and the answers and more information of the different topics. This page grew 2 long and is now split up in NtL I – XX and XXI –   . More pages will be added when the need arises. Name That Volcano(es) Answers. Just that… Special plots page: Shows examples to very nice plots by various “artists” and gives addresses where to find the newest ones by them. Microscopic images: Now this is my true baby. You can find SEM images from various volcanoes all sorted to a separate page. At the moment on El Hierro, Etna, Eyjafjallajökull, Grímsvötn, Kilauea, Merapi, Moubt Hood, Newberry Volcano, Novarupta, Puyehue-Cordón Caulle and the Soufrière Hills. More pages will hopefully be added when fresh ash gets sent. ( by you! ). The addresses and an introduction of the scopes and an instruction how they are used can be found on the main Microscopic images page. If you klick Gems directly, you end upon a page with beautiful images our readers took from webcams. Gems without any relation to volcanoes: Here you could find how to change your avatar, how to make a video or a snapshot  from a webcam, where to upload images, the links to how to do plots, or how to add a smiley and other things. ——————— VC. projects: Posts about special projects we plan to get done on VC go in here. Like Irpsits research on the different ash layers in his backyard and the SEM images. ——————— Library: Must-read books for volcanophiles can be found here. ——————— Crow`s nest: Has 2 bars in the drop down menu. Volcano webcams: selfexplaining Auroralinks: Is here because so many on VC love to watch auroras. ——————— OT Regulars table: OT ( Off Topic )  posts goin here. After they first appeared in Home. ——————— Burfell Dalek BBQ: Comments on the planning of a BBQ in front of a Heklacam went in there but the meeting did not work out. Now you can arrange new meetings in here. Spica