A hexacopter drone wobbles through sulfuric clouds above Marum crater in Vanuatu, its camera capturing footage of a lava lake churning 1,200 feet below. The year is 2015, and this is one of the first times humans get continuous footage of this geological furnace without risking someone’s life.
Turns out, sending robots into volcanoes isn’t just cool—it’s necessary. The temperatures inside active volcanic vents can hit 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit, hot enough to melt the soles off your boots in seconds. The air? Laced with sulfur dioxide and hydrogen sulfide that’ll corrode your lungs faster than you can say “bad idea.” Which is why, for decades, volcanologists have been inching closer to craters with heat-resistant suits and prayers, hoping their measurements would be worth the risk.
When Silicon Valley Meets Molten Rock in Ways Nobody Expected
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory decided to test their VolcanoBot rovers inside Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano in 2014 and 2015. These wheeled robots, each about the size of a toaster, descended into fissures to map the interior structure of lava tubes—spaces where molten rock once flowed. The data they sent back revealed that some tubes were way larger than surface observations suggested, which matters when you’re trying to predict where the next eruption might break through.
But here’s the thing: robots exploring volcanoes aren’t just miniature geologists on wheels.
Some look like something out of a fever dream. Take the spherical robots developed by researchers at Tohoku University in Japan—they literally roll into volcanic craters, propelled by internal mechanisms that shift their weight. In 2017, one of these orbs ventured into Mount Asama, an active volcano that’s erupted repeatedly over the past two decades, collecting gas samples and temperature readings that would’ve been suicide missions for humans. The sphere design means they can tumble down steep slopes without breaking apart, though watching the footage feels like observing a very determined beach ball with a death wish.
Then there’s the swarm approach. University of Bristol researchers deployed multiple low-cost drones simultaneously over Mount Etna in Sicily during a 2018 study, creating a distributed sensor network that mapped gas plume concentrations across several square kilometers. Instead of one expensive robot doing everything, you get a coordinated attack—if one drone fails (and they do fail, regularly, because volcanoes are inherently hostile environments), the others keep collecting data.
The Part Where Everything Goes Wrong Because Of Course It Does
Wait—maybe we’re romanticizing this too much.
Robot failure rates in volcanic environments are embarassingly high. A 2019 study documented that roughly 40% of drone missions into active volcanic zones experienced critical malfunctions, mostly from ash clogging rotors or electronics failing due to extreme heat and humidity. The acidic gases don’t just irritate human lungs—they corrode circuit boards, degrade rubber seals, and turn expensive scientific instruments into very pricey paperweights.
Which is why some researchers are going low-tech. Volcanologist Kayla Iacovino used a modified commercial drone—basically a DJI Phantom with extra propellers and heat shielding—to study Nyiragongo volcano in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2016. Cost? Around $3,000. Compare that to specialized research robots that run $50,000 or more, and suddenly the “good enough” approach starts looking brilliant.
The footage these machines capture is genuinely otherworldly. NASA’s Astrobee robots, originally designed for the International Space Station, are being tested in volcanic environments because—and this is the kicker—lava tubes on Earth might be the closest analog we have to caves on Mars. If we’re going to send robots into Martian volcanic formations, we better make sure they can handle Hawaii first. In 2020, researchers used these cube-shaped floating robots to navigate inside volcanic caves, using compressed air jets to maneuver through tight spaces where wheeled robots would get stuck.
The real breakthrough isn’t the hardware—it’s the data. Robots can now measure volcanic tremors, gas emissions, and temperature fluctuations continuously, sending real-time alerts when eruption indicators spike. Iceland’s Bárðarbunga volcano was monitored by an array of autonomous sensors during its 2014-2015 eruption, the longest Icelandic eruption in decades, generating six months of continuous data that would’ve been impossible to collect manually.
Some scientists are already talking about permanent robot populations living inside volcanoes, charging via solar panels during calm periods and retreating to protective bunkers when things get spicy. It sounds like science fiction, but prototypes exist—researchers at the University of Cambridge tested a solar-powered monitoring station inside Guatemala’s Pacaya volcano in 2018, and it survived for eight months before finally succumbing to a particularly violent erupption.
The irony? We’re building robots tough enough to survive alien planets, and we’re testing them in some of the most alien environments on Earth.
