Automated Volcano Monitoring Using Multiple Space and Ground Sensors

Abstract

From 2004 to 2017, an effort was undertaken to integrate space-borne sensing and in situ sensing in an automated system to improve global volcano activity monitoring. This paper reviews a sensor web concept in which a number of volcano monitoring systems were linked together to more accurately monitor volcanic activity, and used this activity measurement to automatically task space assets to acquire further satellite imagery of the detected volcanic activity. This paper discusses the space and ground sensors and how they were linked together as triggers and responses. Over a 13-year period, more than 160,000 alerts coming from various sources lead to 9050 observations by NASA’s Earth Observing-1 spacecraft—imaging about 218 volcanoes. This paper describes the science products automatically produced onboard the satellite and on the ground such as temperature maps and lava discharge volume estimates that are automatically delivered to subscribing users. To evaluate the effectiveness of an out-tasked volcano monitoring system, this study compares the hit rate of our tasked monitoring system to the systematic monitoring system MODVOLC.