A volcano has erupted in a remote northern region Indonesia and forced hundreds of people to evacuate the area this Wednesday after the mountain spewed lava and a gigantic column of smoke, authorities said.
“Based on visual and instrumental observations that showed an increase in volcanic activity, the (alert) level of Mount Ruang was raised from Level 3 to Level 4,” said Hendra Gunawan, director of the volcanic agency of Indonesiain a statement released late Wednesday.
The authorities also expanded the exclusion zone around the crater from four to six kilometers.
Mount Ruang, a stratovolcano in North Sulawesi province, erupted at 9:45 p.m. on Tuesday and experienced two additional eruptions in the early hours of Wednesday, volcanology and geology authorities reported.
There were no reports of deaths or injuries, but more than 800 people were evacuated from two villages on Ruang island to a neighboring island, state agency Antara reported.
Gunawan warned residents to be “on guard for possible ejection of rock fragments, hot cloud discharges and tsunamis caused by the collapse of the volcanic body into the sea,” the statement said.
The first eruption formed a two-kilometer-long ash column, and then the volcano ejected materials that rose up to 2.5 kilometers, Muhamad Wafid, director of the geology department, said in a statement.
The volcanology agency had warned the previous day that Mount Ruang’s activity had increased after two earthquakes were recorded in recent weeks.
Authorities had imposed a four-kilometer-long exclusion zone around the crater, which is more than 100 kilometers north of the provincial capital Manado in North Sulawesi.
Indonesiawhich has around 130 active volcanoes, experiences frequent seismic and volcanic activity due to its location on the “Pacific Ring of Fire”.
SPRING: AFP
