Hot lava from an erupting volcano killed six people sleeping in a beach village on a small island in eastern Indonesia on Saturday, after ash and smoke from the volcano shot about a mile into the air, officials said.
Mount Rokatenda in East Nusa Tenggara province erupted early Saturday morning, and nearly 3,000 people have been evacuated from the area on Palue island, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency. The volcano has been rumbling since October.
The victims who died included three adults and two children, said agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, adding that the age of the sixth person killed was unclear. He said that the adults’ bodies were recovered from Ponge beach in Rokirole village, but that the children’s remains had not been found.
Officials continued searching Sunday for the bodies of two children buried by the hot lava as rumbling could still be heard from Mount Rokatenda on the small island of Palue in East Nusa Tenggara province.
Nearly 3,000 people have been evacuated from the area since the volcano erupted early Saturday morning, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency. The volcano had been active since last October.
Tini Thadeus, head of the local disaster agency, said the six victims, who died while sleeping in a beachside village, were among those who had refused to leave last year when evacuations were carried out to establish a safety zone around the volcano.
"On their belief, if all the old villagers abandoned the red (danger) zone, then lava will destroy the residential area," Thadeus said from Kupang, the provincial capital. Among the dead was a 58-year-old woman, the grandmother of the two children who also died.
"But unfortunately, not like in the past, lava from Saturday's eruption flowed northward and hit them," Thadeus said, adding that during earlier eruptions since the 1930s, volcanic material had always flowed southward.
Thadeus said he was not optimistic about recovering the children's bodies since they were buried under hot volcanic material.
He said small explosions could still be heard coming from the peak, which was still spewing smoke up to 600 meters (656 yards) into the sky.
"But all of the villagers have been evacuated out of the danger zone" near the crater, he said.
Video footage on Indonesia’s TVOne showed giant plumes of white and gray smoke and ash belching from the volcano into a sunny blue sky. Prior to Saturday’s eruption, many residents had already been moved to safer areas.
The disaster agency said the volcano spewed ash and smoke about 2km into the air. The eruption lasted about seven minutes, said Frans Wangge, who heads the volcano’s monitoring post.
He said the hot lava burned trees around the beach and villages, and made it difficult to reach the area where the victims were killed.
Domi Dange, a Catholic priest helping those who fled to the district town of Maumere on nearby Flores island, said some residents, who had refused to leave when the area was earlier cleared, were sleeping under tents near the beach. However, details about the six people who were killed and where they were located at the time of the eruption remained unclear.
Local authorities, including police and army officials along with members of a search and rescue agency, were heading to tiny Palue island to help with evacuations.
“We will see the best steps to be taken, but clearly they have to be evacuated,” said Yoseph Ansar Rara, chief of Sikka District, which oversees the island. He said those already evacuated had agreed to be relocated to Flores island.
Mount Rokatenda is one of about 129 active volcanoes in Indonesia, an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands that’s home to some 240m people.
The country is prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity because it sits along the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” a horseshoe-shaped series of fault lines.
Monday 12 August 2013
http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/indonesian-volcano-erupts-killing-six-239535.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57598009/search-on-for-childrens-bodies-after-indonesian-volcano-eruption/
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