A vulnerability-based risk assessment of the threatened area surrounding Popocatépetl Volcano to support decision-making during a volcanic crisis

Abstract

Popocatépetl Volcano, located in central Mexico, is surrounded by a densely populated region exceeding 20 million people. The activity of Popocatépetl in the past 5 centuries has been limited to several small to moderate eruptions, similar in style to the current eruptive episode (1994-present). However, since the destruction of an ancestral volcano 23 000 years B. P., Popocatépetl has produced eruptions ranging widely in size and style, including Plinian events and massive sector collapses. Many of the major eruptions have resulted in large volumes of tephra-fall deposits that typically extended at least 20 kilometers to the southeast, about 10 and 15 kilometers to the northeast, and 15 to 18 kilometers to the west. Moreover, some Plinian events have covered much larger areas with pumice-fall, pyroclastic flows and lahar deposits. Based on the present distribution of population and settlements, and considering the experience of evacuations carried out during peaks of the ongoing volcanic activity, in the present work a vulnerability-based risk assessment of the threatened area surrounding Popocatépetl Volcano has been developed. This assessment can provide additional information to support decision-making during the ongoing volcanic crisis.