Leslee
Volcano Erupts in Philippines
The Associated Press
Wednesday, July 25, 2001; 9:40 p.m. EDT
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20010725/aponline214026_001.htm
MANILA, Philippines -- A volcano erupted with lava and towering columns
of ash in the central Philippines early Thursday, forcing thousands of
residents to flee as it rained pebbles and mud, scientists said.
The Mayon volcano spewed lava 200 feet and ash clouds six miles into the
air, said volcanologist Julio Sabit. He said the "big explosion" at 7:56
a.m. was the second this month by the mountain.
"There was an earth-shaking and we heard roaring thunder, and after, we
heard the frying sound of eggs when the pebbles were falling on our
roofs," Jo Malasarte, a resident of Malabog, at the volcano's foot.
School children in his village screamed and fled after the explosion.
Panicked villagers streamed down the mountainside, many of them crowding
roads with private vehicles.
Sabit said scientists first learned of an imminent eruption from sudden
lava flows and started an evacuation less than four hours before the
explosion.
Rain in nearby Legazpi city turned to mud as it mixed with the ash
clouds, blackening the streets of the provincial capital and darkening
the skies.
Scientists said ground-hugging clouds of ash and rock fragments, known
as pyroclastic flows, sped down Mayon's slope early Thursday but no
damage was reported.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology raised alert
levels around the volcano and began evacuating several villages at its
foot.
Less than two weeks earlier, evacuees had returned home following the
previous eruption.
Mayon last erupted June 24, forcing 50,000 people from their homes. The
volcano has erupted at least 47 times since 1616. An ash mud flow buried
a town and killed 1,200 people in the worst known eruption in 1814.
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Thursday, July 26 2:02 AM SGT
50,000 at risk from Philippine volcano, warn geologists
PARIS, July 25 (AFP) -
Nearly 50,000 people are at imminent risk from a gigantic lake that is
building up in the crater of Mount Pinatubo, the Philippine volcano that
erupted 10 years ago, scientists say.
The Philippine authorities have been deaf to their warning that the
crater wall could be breached in "less than a month," sending down a
tidal wave of water and debris that would engulf the town of Botolan at
the foot of the volcano, they add.
The warnings are coming from Kelvin Rodolfo of the University of
Illinois in Chicago and Rosalito Alonso, head of geology research with
the British aid organisation Oxfam, the British weekly New Scientist
reports in next Saturday's issue.
The problem lies with a lake that has built up over the last decade in
Pinatubo's crater, the geologists say.
The water level has been rising by up to 10 metres (over 30 feet) a
year, and the lake now holds around 250 million cubic metres (8.75
billion cubic feet).
Heavy rains in the past few months have now driven the water level
dangerously close to a notch in the crater wall, a location which
comprises a soft crumbly mix of sand and rock deposited by the last
eruption, the geologists say.
Once the water starts to spill over the notch, that will quickly erode
this weak spot in the crater wall.
According to Rodolfo's and Alonso's calculations, if the notch erodes
down 10 metres (33 feet), that will cause 30 million cu. metres (1.05
billion cu. ft.) to spill out, mixing with volcanic sediment on its way
down the slopes to become a cement-like torrent called lahar.
As of May, the water was four metres (14 feet) from the notch, and at
current rates, the wall could give way "in less than a month,"
immediately threatening Botolan and two nearby hamlets, New Scientist
quotes the pair as saying.
"The town would have less than two hours' warning. There is no plan. We
want people to know about it and be prepared," Alonso said.
The two scientists went public with their warning after the Philippine
authorities consulted a Japanese engineer who concluded there was little
likelihood of an imminent breach.
Engineering solutions to the threat include reinforcing the notch or
boring a tunnel into the crater to drain the lake.
However, the authorities say the rainy season is too far advanced to
make these measures feasible, an attitude condemned as dangerously
complacent by Alonso and Rodolfo.
The eruption of Pinatubo in 1991 was one of the most violent volcanic
events of the 20th century.
Hundreds of people were killed and hundreds of thousands had to flee
their homes, and swathes of the Philippine countryside were transformed
into a grey desert by the volcanic ash.