Erupting Bali volcano dusts resorts in ash
A volcano on the Indonesian island of Bali has rumbled into life with a series of eruptions that temporarily disrupted some international flights to the popular tourist destination and dusted nearby resorts and villages with a thin layer of ash.
Mount Agung erupted on Saturday evening and three times early Sunday, lighting its cone with an orange glow and sending ash 4,000 metres into the atmosphere. It is still gushing and the dark grey clouds are moving toward the neighbouring island of Lombok, a direction that is away from Bali’s airport, where nearly all scheduled domestic and international flights were continuing Sunday.
Australian airline Jetstar, which cancelled nine flights to and from Bali on Saturday evening, said most of its flights will operate normally Sunday after its senior pilots assessed it was safe to fly. However it warned that the movement of ash cloud is highly unpredictable and flights could still be cancelled at short notice. Virgin, KLM and Air Asia Malaysia also cancelled several flights Saturday.
“All flights are back to normal,” said Herson, head of the local airport authority, who uses one name.
Disaster officials said ash up to half a centimetre (less than an inch) thick settled on villages around the volcano and soldiers and police were distributing masks.
Authorities warned anyone still in the exclusion zone around the volcano, which extends 7.5 kilometres from the crater in places, to leave.
Made Sugiri, an employee at Mahagiri Panoramic Resort some 10 kilometres from the crater, said a thin layer of volcanic ash reached the area.
“We are out of the danger zone, but like other resorts in the region, of course the eruptions cause a decrease in the number of visitors,” he said.
w“I think these latest eruptions are more dangerous, given the thick clouds it’s releasing,” he said. “Certainly we worry, but we have to wait and see. Hopefully there is no significant eruption.”