Dr. Jose M. Marrero joins the MVO team in the role of Volcanologist – Hazard and Risk Assessment Specialist.
The MVO welcomes Dr Jose Marrero to the role of Volcanologist – Hazard and Risk Assessment Specialist.
Dr. Marrero holds a PhD in Geography by La Laguna University (Canary Island, Spain) and has over 18 years experience in the field of risk and hazard assessment in volcanic active areas. He has had the opportunity to participate in several emergencies in Spain and Ecuador such as volcanic eruptions and earthquakes, where he focused his attention on finding solutions for problems that could arise between scientist, decision makers and the population, as well as generating tools to mitigate those problems.
He has developed the volcanic hazard maps of La Palma (Canary Island, Spain), in which various geographical methodologies where introduced to improve hazard map management, and has also participated in the development of the volcanic early warnings system of El Hierro (Spain) to facilitate the communication of scientific information to Civil Defence and local authorities. In the same realm, he developed a tool (“Topohazard”) that allowed the improvement of the hazard maps of the Cotpaxi volcano (Ecuador) by calculating security areas and better definitions of the hazard limits to turn hazard maps into emergency maps. He also formed part of a research team dedicated to assessing the physical vulnerability of construction to ultimately calculate and map the impact generated by an earthquake in Portoviejo (Ecuador) at detailed scale (building level).
His most recent work as a mayor’s advisor of Quito Metropolitan District, (DMQ, Ecuador) allowed him to manage a significant amount of municipality data (a 3 million people city), by implementing two different methodologies in order to understand the territory and risk. The first, the Exploratory System of Spatial Analysis (SEAE-DMQ) focuses on computationally faster analysis of millions of data to characterize spatial units at different scales for decision making. The second is the Multipurpose and Multi-hazard High Resolution Exposure Model of Quito.
Dr. Marrero replaces Dr. Victoria Miller who vacated the position after 4 years of service.
