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Mount Merapi Erupts
Smoke rises Monday from Indonesia's Mount Merapi, one of the world's most volatile and dangerous volcanoes.
Photograph by Dwi Obli, Reuters
MOUNT MERAPI, Indonesia — A volcanic eruption and a tsunami killed scores of people hundreds of miles apart in Indonesia - spasms from the Pacific "Ring of Fire," which spawns disasters from deep within the Earth.
Tuesday's eruption of Mount Merapi killed at least 18 people, forced thousands to flee down its slopes and spewed burning ash and smoke high into the air on the island of Java.
Meanwhile, off the coast of Sumatra, about 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) west of the volcano, rescuers battled rough seas to reach Indonesia's Mentawai islands, where a 10-foot tsunami triggered by an earthquake Monday night swept away hundreds of homes, killing at least 113 villagers, said Mujiharto of the Health Ministry's crisis center. Up to 500 others are missing.
Thousands of people living on the volcano's fertile slopes began evacuating as Merapi started erupting Tuesday, sending hot ash and rocks high in the air. (See an Indonesia map.)
Scientists had been warning for days that pressure building in the rumbling volcano has the potential to set off an especially violent eruption. (See related pictures of the ten most dangerous U.S. volcanoes.)
"The energy is building up. ... We hope it will release slowly," Indonesian-government volcanologist Surono told reporters, according to the Associated Press. "Otherwise we're looking at a potentially huge eruption, bigger than anything we've seen in years."
Meanwhile, officials in western Indonesia are racing to deal with the aftermath of a deadly tsunami that struck the remote Mentawai Islands late Monday, killing at least 113 and leaving hundreds more missing. The killer wave, triggered by a magnitude 7.7 earthquake centered offshore of the island of Sumatra, had many recalling the December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which devastated the same region.
Smoke rises Monday from Indonesia's Mount Merapi, one of the world's most volatile and dangerous volcanoes.
Photograph by Dwi Obli, Reuters
MOUNT MERAPI, Indonesia — A volcanic eruption and a tsunami killed scores of people hundreds of miles apart in Indonesia - spasms from the Pacific "Ring of Fire," which spawns disasters from deep within the Earth.
Tuesday's eruption of Mount Merapi killed at least 18 people, forced thousands to flee down its slopes and spewed burning ash and smoke high into the air on the island of Java.
Meanwhile, off the coast of Sumatra, about 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) west of the volcano, rescuers battled rough seas to reach Indonesia's Mentawai islands, where a 10-foot tsunami triggered by an earthquake Monday night swept away hundreds of homes, killing at least 113 villagers, said Mujiharto of the Health Ministry's crisis center. Up to 500 others are missing.
Thousands of people living on the volcano's fertile slopes began evacuating as Merapi started erupting Tuesday, sending hot ash and rocks high in the air. (See an Indonesia map.)
Scientists had been warning for days that pressure building in the rumbling volcano has the potential to set off an especially violent eruption. (See related pictures of the ten most dangerous U.S. volcanoes.)
"The energy is building up. ... We hope it will release slowly," Indonesian-government volcanologist Surono told reporters, according to the Associated Press. "Otherwise we're looking at a potentially huge eruption, bigger than anything we've seen in years."
Meanwhile, officials in western Indonesia are racing to deal with the aftermath of a deadly tsunami that struck the remote Mentawai Islands late Monday, killing at least 113 and leaving hundreds more missing. The killer wave, triggered by a magnitude 7.7 earthquake centered offshore of the island of Sumatra, had many recalling the December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which devastated the same region.
