Martinez‑Villegas et al. J Appl. Volcanol. (2021) 10:6 https://doi.org/10.1186/s13617‑021‑00109‑4 RESEARCH Moving for safety: a qualitative analysis of afected communities’ evacuation response during the 2014 Mayon Volcano eruption Ma. Mylene Martinez-Villegas 1,2* , Renato U. Solidum Jr. 1 , Jean A. Saludadez 2 , Abigail C. Pidlaoan 1 and Ruben C. Lamela 1 Abstract This study looks at the 2014 Mayon Volcano eruption to identify possible factors that contribute to the actions that people (local authorities/officials, community leaders, and residents) take during an eruptive period. We used qualita- tive analysis to examine interviews of people who experienced the August–December 2014 Mayon Volcano unrest, to determine the nature of people’s understanding of hazards and risks, their decision-making, and response process. The thematic analysis shows that residents reacted to the information given to them in several ways- they evacuated when ordered (mandatory), chose not to evacuate for various reasons (e.g. they did not believe they are in danger citing experiences, inconvenience in evacuation sites, etc.), and evacuated even when not ordered to (voluntary). The local officials and community leaders were asked about their views on the possible reasons or motivations as to why residents would evacuate, and common themes that emerged were fear emanating from the experience of past eruptions, obeying the order to evacuate because it is the law, and order from provincial authorities (setting aside personal opinion on the state of the volcano based on experiential knowledge), and the potential to receive relief goods for those who are economically in need. This paper also looks at the challenges to local officials when an erup- tive episode occurs- but the event falls short of the expected typical explosive behavior from the volcano. This study argues for people’s experiential knowledge as an important factor in shaping views about hazards and risks that leads to the decision-making of individuals and its importance in risk communication strategies. Keywords: Volcano alert levels, Narrative analysis, Evacuation response, Qualitative analysis, Experiential knowledge © The Author(s) 2021. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativeco mmons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. Introduction Tis work focuses on understanding how the people (local authorities/ofcials, community leaders, and resi- dents) around Mayon Volcano use their knowledge from past eruption experience in shaping their understand- ing of the volcano’s hazards and risks and in developing their views of ongoing activity. Teir constructed views based on experience contribute to how they decide and act when Mayon is declared with unrest. However, other factors come into play (e.g. considerations of afected livelihood, disruption of the way of life, a culture of obe- dience or trust and belief in leadership, etc). Te timeli- ness of information received, the decisions, and actions on the information are crucial, as is the appropriateness of their responses. Tis paper explores how people inter- pret and attach meanings to hazards that infuence their views of risks, from three (3) diferent perspectives: from local ofcials who work within organizations of author- ity (e.g. local Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Ofce or DRRM), community leaders, and from the resi- dents at risk on the ground who live side by side with the Open Access *Correspondence: mylene.villegas@phivolcs.dost.gov.ph; mlmvillegas. phivolcs@gmail.com 1 Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology-Department of Science and Technology (DOST-PHIVOLCS), Quezon City, Philippines Full list of author information is available at the end of the article