Page 42 - Volcano and Geothermal Tourism

Introduction 19

geothermal tourism may also result in a growing is done to raise awareness about the potential
potential for accidents and injuries near such danger of volcanic environments? Is every volcano
active environments, as has been noticed by tourist informed about rescue services and how to
Callander and Page (2003), and Bentley et al contact them through guidelines and instructions
(2007) with certain types of adventure tourism in for emergencies? Who is responsible and in charge
New Zealand, simply because visitors are more in case of an unexpected emergency and how to
interested in observing activity than in taking contact rescue services?
reasonable precautions for their personal safety. An important sub-question here is whether
visitors to volcanic environments are seeking or
Critical questions about risk are able to obtain enough information about
individual destinations from available sources like
management the Internet and guidebooks, as local guidelines
Hazard and risk management in volcanic and instructions for emergencies are not available
environments is extremely challenging due to the everywhere. To be aware of the potential dangers
varying degrees of imminent danger from active in volcanic environments visitors need to know
volcanoes and geothermal fields, which can beforehand how to prevent accidents and who is
generate different types of hazards. Also, remoteness, in charge and/or responsible in an emergency.
difficult terrain and adverse climate conditions Impacting strongly on this situation is one of the
often present additional complications in an most important issues in risk prevention: the
emergency situation. In addition, individual risk language barriers that often exist. Signage,
perception and risk assessment are significant announcements and warnings – do they reach
factors in both risk creation and risk prevention as every visitor or tourist and are they understood
people are influenced in different ways when sufficiently to encourage safe behaviour? In many
deciding responsibility and preparedness for their countries signage is only in one language – this is
personal protection (Paton et al, 2001) while clearly not enough (Figure 1.4). Communication
visiting hazardous environments. A number of can also be a problem in remote areas, as people
questions (Erfurt-Cooper, 2010a) relating to safety increasingly rely on their mobile phones to cover
issues and the overall risk management in areas of the risk of isolation. While in some countries such
volcanic activity will be discussed to highlight the as Iceland the most remote areas have exceptional
need for international guidelines for visitor safety mobile phone cover, this is not the case everywhere
in volcanic and geothermal active regions. The and electronic communication barriers can cause
first question that may come to mind is whether significant problems if relied upon in the case of
tourism close to active volcanoes should be
encouraged and promoted? The answer is a
cautious yes, providing that acceptable risk
management strategies are in place and visitor
numbers do not put the surrounding natural
environment under additional pressure. The next
question is whether the economic benefits from
tourism outweigh the potential risks? This is a
question for the host communities and the local
authorities who are in charge of deciding whether
to open potentially dangerous areas to the public
or not. However, not all volcanoes are closely
monitored. Which raises the next question –
whether visits to currently and/or potentially Figure 1.4 Interpretive signage and signs that contain
active volcanoes are a disaster waiting to happen? warnings should be in more than one language
Unfortunately there is no answer to this as much Note: In areas with many foreign visitors, images or pictograms should
depends on events out of our control. How much be used for immediate visual recognition.

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