At IVHHN's first workshop, the difficulty of setting guidelines for safe exposure to volcanic gases was discussed. The main obstacle was thought to be the lack of information on similar guidelines around the world. Dr Claire Witham (Met Office, UK, formerly University of Cambridge) has written detailed guidelines for different volcanic gases, including not only world-wide occupational and ambient exposure guidelines, but also known health effects, and previous incidents. The guidelines can be reached by clicking on "Guidelines & Databases" in the left hand column or by downloading here as a PDF. IVHHN is extremely grateful to Claire for all her hard work and to Tamar Elias, USGS, for reviewing these guidelines.
Claire has also written guidelines on leachate analyses for volcanic ash. These have just been published online by JVGR and will be available on this website soon. She has also created a database of volcanic disasters and incidents in the 20th Century giving all known figures on deaths and injury. Again, this database will shortly be available on this website.