Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who was due to leave for New York for the United Nations General Assembly, decided to go there immediately on Sunday.
He was under surveillance for several days. The Cumbre Vieja volcano on the Spanish island of La Palma in the Canary Islands erupted on Sunday, September 19, for the first time in fifty years. Large columns of smoke, ash and lava jets escaped from various points of the volcano, as can be seen in the images posted on Twitter by the RTVC channel.
#Direct eruption in #LaPalma#VigilanciaLaPalma #VolcanoLaPalma https://t.co/L7zqJQqIdw
– RTVC (@RTVCes) September 19, 2021
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who was due to travel to New York for the United Nations General Assembly, decided to go there immediately. “The eruption started in the Cabeza de Vaca area of El Paso”, indicated on your Twitter account the local government of the island (cabildo), which started to carry out evacuations in the inhabited areas closest to the volcano. “The population is asked to be extremely careful and stay away from the eruption area to avoid any unnecessary risk”, He continued.
The President of the Canary Islands region, Ángel Victor Torres, in turn underlined the “luck” that this eruption occurred “in an unpopulated area” of this island with more than 80,000 inhabitants, one of seven in the archipelago located on the northwest coast of Africa.
The Ministry of Interior announced that more than 200 members of the security forces were deployed with a helicopter. The last eruption of Cumbre Vieja occurred in 1971.
Of volcanic origin, the Spanish archipelago of the Canaries experienced its last eruption in 2011, this time underwater, on the island of El Hierro, which resulted in the evacuation of several hundred people from certain areas of this island.