Nearly 200 missing from Guatemala volcano

Seven communities evacuated as volcano’s activity increased

ALOTENANGO, Guatemala: Nearly 200 people are missing and at least 75 have been killed since Guatemala’s Fuego volcano began erupting over the weekend, officials said Tuesday.

Seven communities in already devastated areas were evacuated as the volcano’s activity increased, with rescue operations halted.

In the city of Escuintla, near the summit, panicked locals rushed to their cars to escape, causing chaotic traffic.

An AFP photographer saw a large plume of ash rise into the sky, prompting an evacuation of everyone authorities could find before the police, the military and rescuers were ordered to stand down.

And a total of 192 people remain missing since the weekend eruptions, disaster relief agency chief Sergio Cabanas told reporters.

The search for bodies in mountain villages destroyed by the eruption was progressing slowly, officials said earlier, given the nature of the terrain and the way the volcano released large amounts of boiling mud, rock and ash down the mountain.

“We will continue until we find the last victim, though we do not know how many there are. We will probe the area as many times as necessary,” Cabanas told AFP.

However, the prospects of finding any more survivors was poor, he said.

“If you are trapped in a pyroclastic flow, it’s hard to come out of it alive,” he said, adding that people who may have been caught in the flow may never be found.

Among the latest of the 75 fatalities reported by the National Institute of Forensic Sciences was a 42-year-old woman who died in hospital having lost both legs and an arm in the eruption.

The previous toll was given as 73. Some 46 people were injured, around half of whom are in serious condition, officials said.

President Jimmy Morales, who has declared three days of national mourning, has visited the disaster zone. — AFP

— Reuters photo A soldier rescues a girl from a hole in an area affected by the eruption of Fuego volcano in Escuintla, Guatemala.

— Reuters photo A firefighter carries a dog at an area affected by the eruption of the Fuego volcano in the community of San Miguel Los Lotes in Escuintla, Guatemala.

— AFP photo Members of Guatemalan Army search for victims in the ash-covered village of San Miguel Los Lotes.

Reuters photo Rescuers carry the coffin of Juan Fernando Galindo, member of the National Coordinator for Disasters Reduction (CONRED), during his funeral in Alotenango, Guatemala. According to CONRED executive director Sergio Cabanas, Galindo died while attempting...

— AFP photo View of the damage casued by the eruption of the Fuego Volcano.