When Mount St. Helens erupted in 1980, lava incinerated anything living for miles around. As an experiment, scientists dropped gophers onto parts of the scorched mountain for only 24 hours.

A very common case study for volcanoes is the eruption of Mount St Helens in the USA in 1980. Other case studies include the eruption of Mount Etna in Sicily in 1974 and Heimaey eruption in ...