Katia and Maurice Krafft
, French volcanologists who not only loved each other but spent their lives, until their death, among mountains and active volcanoes.
Both scientists are protagonists of the documentary
Fire of Love
, by Sara Dosa, which premiered on Disney+ and was nominated for the Oscars.
The film is based on volcanology, which is "an observational science," the documentary says.
And the Kraffts saw more than almost anyone in their day.
"Fire of Love".
The documentary that was nominated for an Oscar.
Katia and Maurice Krafft: a bond through the years
Born in 1942 in the Rhine Valley, in French Upper Alsace, Catherine Joséphine Conrad, better known as Katia or Katja, was interested in volcanoes from a very young age.
Later he met Maurice Krafft at the University of Strasbourg, where he was studying Physics and Geochemistry.
The couple bonded over their common love of volcanoes before marrying in 1970
.
It is not known exactly what drew Katia to this very specific interest, but it is known that she brought a formidable intelligence to her association.
together, the Kraffts wrote some 20 scientific books and articles on volcanoes from around the world.
In the process, they helped educate those who lived in volcanic areas about the dangers of their sleeping giant neighbors.
"Maurice and Katja have provided unparalleled photography and filming of almost every major volcanic eruption in the last 25 years," wrote Jorg Keller in the Bulletin of Volcanology in 1992.
Maurice and Katia passed away in 1991.
Keller explains that Krafft and her husband made "great strides" in educating the general public in volcanology.
His filming had more value than the scientist.
For example, when Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines began to show signs of an imminent eruption in 1991, the Kraffts were able to present Philippine President Cory Aquino with images of the effects of the 1985 eruption of Nevado del Ruiz in Colombia. , which led him to request the evacuation of those who were in the danger zone.
with volcanoes to death
To gather the information it was necessary to venture closer to the mouths of the volcanoes than was humanly safe.
In the 1987 documentary
The Volcano Watchers
, we see Krafft in white shorts and a T-shirt, with a heavy backpack on her back, as she, Maurice, and another colleague push a loaded bicycle up a hill toward the top of an Italian volcano.
They could be vacationers about to set up camp.
Katja and Maurice insisted that risk should always be calculated and minimized
, but that this kind of study should be done closely," Keller wrote in what became, sadly, the Kraffts' obituary.
Mount Uzen.
The volcano where Katia and Maurice died in 1991.
The Kraffts lost their lives, along with more than 40 others, during the eruption of Mount Unzen in Japan on June 3, 1991.
They were trapped in a pyroclastic flow of rock, gas, and ash that was moving at speeds of more than 100 miles per hour
, with temperatures of more than 800 degrees Fahrenheit.
Katya was 49 years old;
Maurice, 45. And her love and science story also had a place in the last installment of the Oscars.
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