Scientists believe they have discovered a sure fire way of predicting the savagery of volcanic eruption by measuring water within magma.

Yes, water, as this correspondent makes no claim to being a scientist (or indeed correspondent) of any great repute he will stop thinking about how water can exist within molten rock at 1000 degrees C and report the facts as they were given at the British Association festival of science in Norwich. This will stop him getting too much of a headache.

Scientists usual ways of monitoring active volcanoes is to use ground deformation and the release of gasses and measure how they change over time. As volcanic eruptions are caused by gasses venting from magma (the molten rock that has starred in so many 70’s dinosaur movies).  It would be more beneficial to measure the magma itself, but this is rather problematic. The magma flows are usually deep underground, and not only that, they tend to be uncomfortably warm.

Magma at high pressure is more likely to vent explosively, and high pressure magma also forms larger amounts of water bubbles within it. So by measuring the amount of these bubbles or to use the correct term, melt inclusions, are within magma vented in minor eruptions scientists can get a clearer idea of how likely, and more importantly, how violently, the volcano is to blow its top.

This new process is currently being used to monitor Mount St Helens in the US, scientists report that it’s all quiet for now. They are hopeful this new method, when used in conjunction with existing methods, will help them successfully predict the behaviour of volcanoes and save hundreds, if not thousands of lives.

But its water.

In magmaâ?¦

I need Aspirin.

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Keywords: Dinosaur movies, headaches., Volcano