Fire of Love: Kraffs' Way Back Home

“There’s a fire in the world, and in this fire, two lovers find a home.”

This is the opening line of the documentary Fire of Love, directed by Sara Dosa. The 93-minutes-long eye-searing film tells the romantic adventures of the only volcanic couple in the world.

Katia Kraff and Maurice Kraff were two French volcanologists who would dance at the bursting lava pool. The duo was referred to as a “volcanic couple.” Together, they had seen more than 170 eruptions. During the journeys, they would sit on the ground heated by the lava, even when the temperature was as high as 140℃. They would observe the volcanoes until they got burnt. Maurice said that the injuries were baptism for volcanologists and that they would do anything to live a life of watching eruptions. They are the intrepid, obsessive outliers who did things that others couldn’t understand. The Kraffs’ journey stopped when Mt. Unzen erupted back in 1991, yet with the archives they left, Dosa has relived their memories in the film Fire of Love.

Katia and Maurice said they love human by getting away from them. At first, they fled from the humanity they were disappointed in to seek comfort in the magnificent eruptions. After they had experienced the destructive force of volcanoes and lost a friend, their curiosity progressed into concerns for humans. With years of scientific observations, they wrote books, made educational videos, and appeared on TV. Their effort worked, and the volcanic dangers were well-understood; thus, many disasters had been prevented and lives saved.

People are deeply moved by the romantic heroism of the couple’s life. When watching Fire of Love, one may also be inspired to think about how to live a meaningful life.

“I prefer a short life to a monotonous, long one.” - the Kraffs.

The Kraffs are the only volcanic couple who haved seen the most active volcanoes in the world. “I don’t think there would be people like us, and if there are, I will pity them. It is hard for volcanologists to live together. It’s volcanic! We erupt often.” said Maurice.

As a child, Maurice was into geology. His childhood was all about dinosaurs and trilobites. Ever since he went to see the Stromboli with his father at seven, he was deeply attracted to volcanoes. When 19, he revisited the Stromboli, feeling ecstatic and lonely at the same time. Katia understood this well, for her childhood interest in volcanoes was also not shared among kids around her. There was a time when she was sent to schools for unruly girls. She persuaded her family to take her to Mount Etna, where she saw the flow of lava and eruption for the first time, and the rosy world of stones and minerals glowed by the bubbling lava deeply impressed her.

There’s no definitive account of how the couple met each other. Maybe Katia and Maurice met each other in a bar back in 1966. They boned for their first love: Mt. Etna and Mt. Stromboli. With a quick meeting of minds, they deeply fell in love and initiated a life of chasing fire.

“We do everything together, and we can’t work without each other,” Katia said. I like it when Maurice walks in front of me since he is twice my weight. I know that wherever he goes, I can also go. I follow him because if he is going to die, I’d rather be with him. So I follow him.” said Katia. “There is the pleasure of approaching the beast, not knowing it will catch you soon. I couldn’t love someone who doesn’t share that love on top of the volcano. ” The two must stay in sync, or else they will face great danger. Katia can not be with Maurie and vice versa. It takes a person of resilience and grit to immerse in the magma world. .

“Once you see an eruption, you can’t live without it.” - the Kraffs.

Born and raised in the ruins of Alsace, Katia and Maurice felt unsure and uncertain about the world. Disappointed in humanity, they expected to seek comfort in the myths of nature. Humans are so small and insignificant, and the magnificence and unknowability of volcanoes have just so much to offer. They read books of scientific evidence, of myths and legends, trying to figure out how the earth forms and reforms, only to get closer to the facts of nature. So, a geochemist and a geologist, with a modest grant and a donated car, decided to explore the volcanoes.

This is an adventure that is only to be completed with two persistent and passionate hearts. Just like one line from the film “One can only dream of volcanoes, but two can reach them.” On their journey, the car broke 27 times and eventually crashed. There were injuries too. Maurice once accidentally fell in the hot spring in some crater and got burnt badly, with his skin “peeling like onions.” The long sleeves and trousers were often reduced to shorts and underwear in the end. Despite all the difficulties, they forged ahead with research, experiments, and further inquiries. The myths of volcanoes finally unveil themselves. They captured the parabolic trajectory of volcanic bombs and the glass wool stretched by magma to form Pele’s hair and collected materials for the study of plate tectonics.

“Once you see an eruption, you can’t live without it,” said Katia. When a volcano erupts, the spectacle of mushrooming gas clouds, surging magma, and scorching lava only reminds people of their insignificance. After all, we are just a speck of dust in this gargantuan, indifferent planet. The Kraffs knew too well about this, and their awe, and respect were communicated through the lenses. They decided not to have children and all their life was about volcanoes, volcanoes, and volcanoes. For them, volcanoes are sentient beings with intelligence, so they never classify volcanoes but treat them as unique individuals.

There were times when they had to return to Alsace to organize the materials they collected in field research. They would make mini-volcanoes and simulate the eruptions at home. “If rocks are edible, I’ll never leave volcanoes,” said Maurice.

The Kraffs are the wandering volcanologists to the public and weirdos to their colleagues, which they pleasantly accepted. Their obsession is insane, and the radar for searching erupting volcanoes is always on. Whenever they know about an active volcano, they would go there immediately.

“I imagine the spectacle of seeing from above. A ridiculous column of tiny ants, climbing up the back of the giant beast and saying in arrogance: I climb upon to understand you. To tear your thousand-year-old history secrets from you so that science can progress.” said Katia

They get so close to the abyss to observe and sometimes camp beside a crater for two weeks. “Curiosity is stronger than fear,” said Katia. There are scenes featuring Maurice paddling in the sulfuric acid pool, playfully frying eggs on hardened magma, and Katia gazing into the crater when the lava bursts out... They were not fearless and admitted that “we were crazy.” But still, they would do anything to get closer. Maurice was interviewed as saying, “I don’t mean to be philosophical, but it was Nietzsche who said: A fool is someone who has lost everything but his reason.” It was his life’s dream to sail in a canoe on the flowing lava. “I know it will kill me, but it doesn’t bother me.”

Since the 1880s, clocks have been created to replace the timing from the rotation of the sun and moon, and henceforth, everything can be scheduled. Yet nature doesn’t follow human timing, and volcanoes are unpredictable. No one can say for sure when a volcano will erupt and how destructive it will be. So, all scientists who go to the eruption sites to research are risking their lives, and the Kraffs shrug off the concerns. As their obituary puts it “The risks should always be minimized, but this type of close study has to be done.”

There were times of dejection, especially when facing the brutal facts of disasters. They had seen life engulfed by fire at the erupted site of Mount Nyiragongo. Nothing left but ruins and painful memories. Even though they were the scientists who accounted for results with well-equipped science, they still trembled for the sufferings of all things. In 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted, claiming more than 50 lives, destroying thousands of acres of land, and wiping out entire animal and plant communities. The destructive force was 250 thousand times stronger than the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima by America. The Kraffs’ best friend, David Johnston, died in the disaster, too.

The Kraffs are the intrepid outliers who are immersed in the magma-covered universe, but also the scientists who care for the future of humanity. They advise the authorities to prevent volcanic disasters and reduce costs by evacuating people away from the dangerous sites. In 1985, the Drus volcano in Nevada erupted, and the mudslide swallowed the villages, causing deaths of up to 22,000. The disaster could have been avoided if the decision-maker had taken the advice indicated in a Kraffs report about the eruption. For the first time, Katia and Maurice doubted themselves because it seemed that whatever they did could not help save lives. The volcanoes were just unpredictable. “Does it have to kill ?” Maurice said. When seeing the sufferings of people in disaster-stricken areas, Katia said they were embarrassed to call themselves volcanologists.

It was from then on that they started to make educational documentaries instead of academic reports. They made the founding of their scientific observations accessible and easy for the public to understand. According to the Katiffs, there were only two kinds of volcanoes: the red ones whose activities can be traced and heralded and the gray ones with killing secrets. Only 50 out of 350 volcanologists around the world then specialized in the gray volcanoes, so Katia and Maurice decided to crack the hard nut.

Starting in 1966, when they met, and over the next 25 years, the two traveled to as many active volcanoes as they could find, from Zaire to Colombia to Iceland to America to Japan. The Kraffts wrote about 20 books and a plethora of scientific papers on volcanoes across the globe. In the process, they helped educate those living in volcanic areas about the hazards of their sleeping behemoth neighbors. After their untimely deaths in 1991 near Mt. Unzen in Japan, the couple left behind materials immortalizing both their shared fascination with the earth’s cataclysmic power and the intensity of their bond.

Like Maurice said, “What could you have when you may die at any time? I’ve seen many wonders that make me feel life has extended for one hundred years. To be frank, I’ll die for this life. ”

In the long river of human history spanning two million years, two insignificant humans, born at the same place and at the same time, loved one thing, and their love has made humans closer to the planet we live.