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During the 1902 eruption, professor Alfred Lacroix was the first to stress the need for a permanent monotoring of the volcano. During his field work in Martinique, he had established 2 observation stations around mount Pelée. One on the East coast, at Assier (Lorrain), the other one on the Morne-des-Cadets (Fonds-St-Denis). The latter was then chosen for the construction of the observatory. However, a few years after the end of the eruptive crisis in 1905, the attention paid to the volcanic monitoring quickly decreased. The main signs of the reactivation of mount Pelée in 1929 were therefore unperceived, for lack of sufficient equipment and gaps during the time of observation. The monitoring of the new eruptive crisis was carried out by the Boutrin-Revert mission from the Morne-des-Cadets, and by the American volcanologist Frank A. Perret. The latter carried out its observations from Saint-Pierre, and from a provisional observation post, located on Morne Lénard, dominating the valley of Blanche river. Perret's observation post, 1931 (ph. Perret / Carnegie Institution of Washington) The eruption of 1929-1932 indirectly contributed to the provision of an appropriation for the construction in 1937 of the permanent observatory on the site of the Morne-des-Cadets. |
Volcanic Risks 
