Catarina Debiya

SAO JORGE. Portugal. (Reuters). Fatima Viveiros was a small girl when she made the decision to become a volcanologist. It was the realization of a childhood dream. At 44 years old, she now uses her knowledge to help protect her home.

For seven days, the volcanic island Sao Jorge in mid-Atlantic, which she was born, has been shaken by over 14,000 earthquakes.

Experts like Viveiros are concerned that the tremors with magnitudes as high as 3.3 may trigger a major earthquake or a volcanic eruption.

“My home lies on an active volcano system,” declared Viveiros who is a seismo–volcanic surveillance center for CIVISA in the area.

“When (something) happens in our house we must be a little bit cold-blooded to ensure our feelings don’t affect our thinking,” she said. The feelings exist because this is my place, it’s my family.

Viveiros had a yellow device on her back that measured soil gasses on Sao Jorge (an island off the Azores archipelago), an autonomous region in Portugal.

Soil gases like CO2 and sulphur are signs of volcanic activity. Viveiros has spent days fighting strong winds and heavy rain to find the answer. The levels have remained normal so far.

The sudden rise in seismic activity at Sao Jorge is similar to the earthquakes that were detected on Spain’s La Palma Island last year (1,400km (870 miles) southwest of the Azores).

This eruption ravaged thousands of crops and properties over 85 days.

Viveiros visited La Palma in order to monitor the soil gases and support the Canary Islands Volcanology Institute. He said that Sao Jorge’s volcano system is similar to one found on the Spanish island.

She said that one of the scenarios she could consider was for something very similar to the La Palma incident. After monitoring the soil gases in the area used by cow grazing, she added:

She added that experts from Spain and abroad are available to travel to Sao Jorge, if necessary.

CIVISA elevated the volcanic alert level to Level 4 Wednesday. This means that there’s a real possibility of a volcano erupting.

Jose Bolieiro Azores, President of Azores, said that recent earthquakes which struck Sao Jorge are twice those reported in the whole region in last year.

He stated to reporters, “There’s clearly an anomaly.”

Authorities have stated that the volcano is not likely to occur, but around 1500 have fled the island via air and sea since then. Many don’t know when they can return.