|
Life as usual in volcano's shadow
12/02/2001 08:05 - (SA)
Mount Merapi, Indonesia - Villagers living in the shadow of Mount Merapi said on Monday they had nothing to fear as Indonesia's most active volcano continued to spit out hot ash and debris.
Scientists monitoring the 2 968 metre-high peak on the
densely populated Java Island said activity inside the crater had
subsided, but an eruption was still possible.
"It could happen anytime," said Purowono, who like many Indonesians only uses one name. "We are still on major alert status."
Even so, hundreds of people living on the mountain's slopes returned home on Monday after spending two nights in temporary evacuation shelters, emergency co-ordinators said.
They had fled the mountain's vulnerable western slopes on Saturday when a huge cloud of hot gas threatened to engulf their villages.
Many living around the volcano believe that spirits watch over the peak and will always warn them when a major eruption is imminent.
One local man, who goes by the single name of Roso, said elders in his village had not received any "whisperings" from the peak's spirits so far and so it was safe to stay put.
"At the moment everything is normal," he said.
Although most Indonesians are Muslim, many also follow pre-Islamic animist beliefs and worship ancient spirits. Often at full moons, people trek to crater rims and throw in rice, jewellery and live
animals to appease the volcanoes.
Some believe that the latest rumblings are linked to an ongoing political crisis in the world's fourth-most populous nation. They say Merapi started spewing out ash and lava after lawmakers
launched an unprecedented bid to impeach President Abdurrahman
Wahid from office.
"Many people believe that Merapi's current activity ... could be a forewarning of a culmination of the (political) crisis," said an
editorial in The Jakarta Post newspaper on Monday.
Mount Merapi lies about 18 miles from Yogyakarta, a city of 1 million people.
In 1994, 66 people were burned to death by a searing ash cloud that engulfed a farming village. In 1930, about 1 300 people were killed when Merapi blew its top.
Indonesia sits astride the "Ring of Fire" - a series of volcanoes and fault lines stretching from the Western Hemisphere through Japan and Southeast Asia to New Zealand.
Indonesia has 500 volcanoes, more than any other nation, and at least 129 are considered active.
- AP
|
