VEI stands for Volcanic Explosivity Index. It is a measure of how explosive
and how big an eruption is. It is kind of like the Richter scale for
earthquakes, but it is not quite as simple. You can imagine how complicated
things could get comparing a small explosive eruption to a long-lasting but
slow-moving lava flow eruption. The small explosive eruption would produce a
tiny volume of material but might be really dangerous. ON the other hand, the
long-lasting lava eruption might produce a huge volume of lava but not put any
ash into the air or threaten anybody with harm.
For this reason deciding what VEI to asign to a particular eruption is
sometimes kind of subjective.
There have been a number of previous questions about the VEI. You might want
to try using the VolcanoWorld searcher to see if there is more information in
the answers to the previous questions that will be useful to you.
Scott Rowland, University of Hawaii
Laura Browne
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