Asia-Pacific

Gas clouds shoot down Indonesia volcano

(AP)
Updated: 2006-05-15 18:42

Police at roadblocks prevented vehicles from getting within five miles of the volcano's crater, but allowed evacuated villagers to walk in, advising them to leave again by nightfall.

"My feeling is it will not blow at this time," a 30-year-old farmer, Budi, said as he returned to cut grass to feed his cows.

Scientists, however, feared an eruption could be imminent for Merapi, which is about 250 miles east of Indonesia's capital, Jakarta.

The mountain, which is one of 129 active volcanoes in Indonesia, sent out a searing cloud of gas that burned 60 people to death when it last erupted in 1994. About 1,300 people died in a 1930 eruption.

The deadly clouds, which contain a mix of hot ash, rock fragments and volcanic gas, are a big worry, said Sugiono, one of the scientists on a team monitoring the volcano 24 hours a day.

He said a glowing dome of lava being formed by magma forced to the surface was poised to collapse and could send searing clouds down the mountain at several hundred miles an hour.

"Hot clouds keep appearing all the time," Sugiono said. "If you get stuck in them, then you have no chance."