Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki erupted again on Thursday, Nov. 7 in an even larger incident than the one that killed nine people and injured dozens of others three days ago.
There were no immediate reports of casualties from the latest eruption.
The 1,584-meter (5,197-foot) volcano on the remote island of Flores shot billowing columns of ash 11 times on Thursday, with the latest and largest rising 8,000 meters (26,240 feet), said Hadi Wijaya, the head of Center for Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation.
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Photos show residents and school children running for their lives on Thursday morning using the volcanic eruption just days after another eruption on Monday, Nov. 4.
Some said it was the biggest eruption they had ever seen from Lewotobi Laki-Laki.
“This is the first time I saw this big eruption since I’ve been living in Lewolaga village,” said Anastasia Adriyani, 41, who lives outside the exclusion zone.
“I was cooking at the community kitchen (for evacuees) and when it happened, I ran back home. I was very scared.”
The volcano had shown less activity since Monday’s deadly eruption killed nine people and injured 64 others.
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Monday’s eruption affected more than 10,000 people in 10 villages. About 4,400 villagers moved into makeshift emergency shelters after the eruption, which destroyed seven schools, nearly two dozen houses and a convent on the majority-Catholic island.
Volcanic materials, including smoldering rocks, lava and hot, thumb-size gravel and ash were thrown up to 7 kilometers (4.3 miles) from its crater on Monday.
While visiting the devastated areas, officials found craters where rocks fell during eruptions, up to 13 meters (43 feet) wide and 5 meters (16 feet) deep, in several places including a destroyed school.
“It shows a difference in characteristics from the previous eruption in January,” said Wijaya, head of the volcanology center. He added that the earlier eruption mostly unleashed volcanic materials around the peak, followed by lava flows.
“We are still analyzing the change of Lewotobi’s eruption character, which will be used by the government to determine a safe relocation site for residents,” Wijaya said.
He said his agency has asked the local government of East Nusa Tenggara province to close the only road connecting Maumere, the island’s largest city, to the neighboring district of Larantuka, as it passes through the volcano’s danger zone.
