Scientist runs for the half-full glass

     [Andrew] Macfarlane's head was spinning. The injury to his skull started to swell. His mind flashed to Dr. Peter Baxter's talk at the workshop the day before.

     Fifty percent, Macfarlane thought. Baxter had said that when people are caught in a volcanic explosion, 50 percent usually survive. He winced as rock fragments battered his shins and thighs. Fifty percent. "It was a source of great encouragement for me," he recalled. Aloud, he repeated to himself as he ran: "We won't all die. We won't all die. We won't all die."

Victoria Bruce, No Apparent Danger: The True Story of Volcanic Disaster at Galeras and Nevado Del Ruiz (New York: HarperCollins, 2001),  ch. 11.