Gamblers Take Odds on the Next Violent Volcanic Eruption
Seismologists and geologists would love to know which volcano is going to erupt next. Now, so do bookies, odds-fixers and those with a taste for games of chance. Paddy Power, Ireland's largest bookmaker, is taking bets on which volcano around the world will next blow its top to the tune of a VEI-3 eruption. Following the recent eruption of Philippine's Mount Mayon, apparently Paddy Power was flooded with requests by -- and we're quoting here -- "punters around the globe" who wished to wager on nature's next super-destructive geo-seismic event. Apologies up front to Japan; it seems the odds are stacked against you. A VEI-3 eruption (that's Volcanic Explosivity Index, something like a Richter Scale for volcanic activity, but with better adjectives) is considered "severe" but not uncommon, the kind of event that shook Italy's Mount Etna in 2002-2003 (by comparison, Mount St. Helens' 1980 eruption was a level 5, or...