Some signs of normalcy after Indonesian
volcano eruption.
Some things returned to normal in Indonesia on Saturday after
a volcano erupted two days before, but tens of thousands of evacuees were yet
to return to their homes.
The eruption
of Mount Kelud shot hot ash into the sky, killing four people.The country's
national air carrier, Garuda Airlines, resumed service to Central Java, an area
covered in the gray ash. The airport in the city of Semarang reopened.
The disaster
management agency on Friday said that six more airports were closed in the wake
of Kelud's outbreak.The inundation of ash in the air can be dangerous to jet
engines. It also forced tens of thousands more out of their homes.
Of those who
died, two perished from smoke inhalation, while the third was hit by a
collapsing wall. A fourth person died when ash caused a roof to collapse.
Officials
said Indonesia's disaster mitigation agency said all the victims lived within a
seven-kilometer or four mile radius of the volcano. Their villages were covered
in nearly eight inches of ash and were hit by large rocks.
Mount Kelud,
located in the eastern part of the main island of Java, had been spewing ash
high into the air, as a smoke plume has risen from out of its crater into the
sky.
The
government raised its eruption alert to its highest level overnight, and
authorities have ordered an evacuation of all residents in a ten-kilometer radius
of the volcano in eastern Java.
Indonesian
Volcano forces evacuations At the height of the crisis Friday one millions people
evacuated. But by late Friday, a webcam from the nation's vulcanology society
that is trained on the volcano's crater showed it to be calm.
Mount Kelud
last erupted in two thousand and seven, but it has ramped up activity in the
past ten days. In one thounsand and ninety, an eruption killed more than trity
people and injured hundreds. Indonesia is part of the vast "Pacific Ring
of Fire," an area of colliding continental plates where powerful
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions often occur.
