A red hot love affair: The daredevil couple who have made studying volcanoes their life's work
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Dicing with death photographing the world's most deadly volcanoes wouldn't be everyone's idea of a perfect day - but for one daredevil couple it's their life.
Donna and Steve O'Meara have been researching and photographing deadly volcanoes since they first met in 1986.
They even spent one of the first dates hovering in a helicopter above an eruption of the world's most active volcano, Kilauea, in Hawaii.
Hot: A violent explosion of lava fragments fills the air during an eruption of Kilauea. The O'Mearas hope to discover a system for predicting volcanoes before they happen
Stunning: The O'Mearas captured the Kilauea Volcano erupting in Hawaii in all its glory
Donna and Steve O'Meara have been researching and photographing deadly volcanoes since they first met in 1986. Pictured here is a volcanic waterspout that formed near there boat on one volcano-watching trip
Not content with just visiting the violent volcano, the daredevil duo decided to marry on top of it and even decided to move there, where they now live with their dog Daisy Duke.
Together the couple have visited over 100 of the world's active volcanoes, taking stunning images of violent eruptions and spectacular fountains of lava.
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ShareBut the pair also spend their time researching the volcanoes in a bid to predict when they are likely to erupt in order to save the lives of those living close to them.
They run their own company, Volcanic Watch, working not only to capture the beauty of volcanoes, but to discover the science behind them and educate people about their dangers.
Donna and Steve O'Meara have even built a house on Kilauea Volcano in Hawaii, the world's most active volcano
Mrs O'Meara said: 'You could die everytime you go to a volcano but you have to go to volcanoes and observe them in order to learn new things about them.
'Santa Maria Aguito in Guatemala has to have the most dangerous eruptions with frequent giant mud flows of ash, which literally wipe out entire towns at hurricane speeds.
'We visited in 1992, the people living there were so nice. But just a few weeks after we arrived home an eruption wiped out the entire village, it was really sad.'
Despite the devastating destruction caused by volcanic eruptions, Mrs O'Meara continues to admire their beauty. And while the couple live on the most active volcano in the world - with over 80 eruptions in the last 200 years - Mrs O'Meara insists they wouldn't want to live anywhere else.
The couple enjoy getting as close as possible to Kilauea Volcano, where they actually got married
She said: 'As an artist and photographer to me volcanoes are the most beautiful things in the world. People always ask if I'm afraid living on such an active volcano but I love this place.'
When they're not at home, Mr and Mrs O'Meara travel the world exploring and sometimes delving into the depths of some of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world.
Mr O'Meara is working on the theory that the cycle of the moon can be used to predict when a volcano is likely to erupt. One day he hopes to predict when a volcano will erupt and help save the lives in the future. 'We want to create colour-coded calendars, days showing the lowest and highest volcanic activity,' Mr O'Meara said.
Despite his familiarity with volcanoes, Mr O'Meara sounded a note of caution for anyone similarly inspired to study them. 'It is dangerous and we are always cautious, you have to be, one moment of stupidity could cost you your life,' he said.
'If you get too close to a volcano, you could actually see your blood boil; you would literally burn from the inside out.'
Daredevil: Donna & Steve OMeara at the summit caldera of Kilauea, in Hawaii, with their dog Daisy Duke. That white smoky plume is ash and steam rising from the lava lake hidden below
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