Human Resilience In The Caribbean

The island of Montserrat, located in the eastern part of the Caribbean suffered from a volcanic dome collapse on the 20th of July 1999. This collapse devastated the island, causing destruction to two-thirds of the human settled areas on the south side of the island. While this event is volcanic in nature, it’s not an eruption and therefore not classified as a volcanic disaster. This resulted from the way the local government enacted emergency plans. There was a planned exclusion zone surrounding the volcano and there was a mass evacuation in this area that prevented human loss. They exhibited great human resilience at this time, especially complicated by the fact that the island was still in recovery mode from previous volcanic incidents. The local government was still able to react to the impending dome collapse while in this recovery mode. Many people are exposed to traumatic or disastrous situations in their lifetimes. Their ability to continue on in their lives with little interruption is a testament to human resilience. Sometimes human resilience is interrupted, usually manifesting in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorders or Acute Stress Reactions. Often those individuals at risk for this are those that lack insight, have unstable family foundations, have previous mental health problems, or lack of support (Ley, 2008).

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However, unlike earthquakes, the primary hazards of a volcanic eruption are harmful to humans. Primary hazards include the eruption of volcanic and super-heated gases, pyroclastic and lava flows and air-fall tephra. Secondary hazards include things such as landslides, tsunami, changing ground structure (Rashed & Weeks, 2003). These are similar to earthquakes because often small amounts of seismic activity are present during volcanic eruptions. Rift, hot spot and subduction volcanoes are those at most risk for seismic