In Situ Sampling of Volcanic Emissions with a UAV Sensorweb: Progress and Plans

A consortium of NASA, commercial, and academic partners, we have begun utilize small UAVs and aerostats for in situ sampling of volcanogenic gases and aerosols, using Turrialba Volcano as natural laboratory. Significant progress has been made over the last several years in utilizing single platforms with a number of newly miniaturized instruments appropriate to aircraft with sub-500 gm payloads. For example, we have been mapping the SO₂-water-vapor plume at Turrialba, for comparison with NASA spacecraft-based (e.g., ASTER) data, and are measuring diffuse CO₂ emissions over the volcano’s flanks, as well as in and near its eruption column. Future work will include devising strategies, platforms, and instrumentation for deployments of multiple UAV formations (“swarms”) as 2D and 3D time-series meshes, to better characterize the mass fluxes and dynamics of emissions. We plan to undertake test flights in the United States, as well as at Turrialba and Poas Volcanoes in Costa Rica. Our most immediate aims are to improve characterizations of local emissions for mitigation of proximal volcanic hazards and for validation of abundance retrievals and transport models based on orbital data. Overall, of course, we strive to better understand how volcanoes work, specifically to better constrain estimates of global SO₂ and CO₂ perennial (diffuse) and event-related (eruptive) emissions—changes in which may foster regional and global climate perturbations.