Compiled by Sahar Yaghoubi
Authorities in Indonesia have issued the highest level of alert for the region east of Java island after a volcano erupted on Sunday, sending a cloud of ash 15 kilometers into the air and prompting the evacuation of almost 2,000 people.
There were no reports of injuries from the Semeru volcano’s eruption, and the Indonesian transport ministry claimed that air traffic was unaffected, albeit alerts had been issued to two regional airports.
Volunteer Bayu Deny Alfianto told Reuters over the phone from the volcano, “Most routes have been blocked since this morning and now it is pouring volcanic ash and it has obscured the view of the mountain.”
Semeru, Java’s highest peak, erupted in 2016, displacing thousands of people and killing more than fifty people.
Authorities in Indonesia have distributed masks and relocated 1,979 people to 11 shelters, according to the country’s disaster mitigation agency (BNPB). At 2:46 a.m. (19:46 GMT on Saturday), the eruption started, and rescue, search, and evacuation operations began immediately.
After originally being on high alert because of the potential for a tsunami, Japan’s Meteorology Agency has now confirmed that the ash cloud from the volcano has reached an altitude of 50,000 feet (15 km). Some time later, it was dismissed as a possibility.
Several earthquakes in the west of Java, including one that killed more than 300 people only last month, preceded the eruption, which occurred 640 km (400 miles) east of the capital, Jakarta.
Semeru’s eruption core is located within a radius of 8 kilometers (5 miles), and locals have been told not to go closer than that without first obtaining special permission from the Indonesian Center for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation, PVMBG.
It said that hot ash clouds had spread out about 12 miles (19 km) from the eruption’s epicenter.
The head of the PVMBG, Hendra Gunawan, has said that more magma may have built up since the volcano’s previous eruptions in 2021 and 2020, which may pose a larger threat to a wider region.
He predicted that Semeru’s scorching vapors would spread far and wide, to areas dense with people’s homes.
Villagers were seen fleeing the slopes of the volcano, some with their goods heaped on motorcycles, in a video supplied to Reuters by local police. Ash from a nearby volcano blanketed a broken bridge.
Indonesia has 142 volcanoes and 8.6 million people live within 10 kilometers (6 miles) of one, more than any other country in the world.
The 5.6-magnitude quake that struck West Java in late November was relatively shallow, yet it nonetheless caused fatalities. On Saturday, a quake of a magnitude of 6.1 hit at a deeper depth, sending people fleeing from buildings but causing no serious damage or injuries.
