Raging planet
At least 25 dead in Guatemala amid struggling rescue efforts
Guatemala’s Fuego volcano belching a thick plume of black smoke and ash, followed soon after by an 8km stream of red hot lava during its most violent eruption in more than four decades. (Below) Soldiers bringing children covered in hot ash to hospital after the eruption in El Rodeo.
EL RODEO: A fiery volcanic eruption in Guatemala sent lava flowing into rural communities, killing at least 25 as rescuers struggled to reach people where homes and roads were charred and blanketed with ash.
The death toll rose late on Sunday with 18 bodies found in the community of San Miguel Los Lotes, disaster agency spokesman David de Leon said, adding to the seven victims previously confirmed elsewhere earlier in the day.
At least 20 people were injured and authorities have said they feared the death toll could rise with an undetermined number of people unaccounted for.
The Volcan de Fuego, or “Volcano of Fire,” exploded in a hail of ash and molten rock shortly before noon on Sunday, blanketing nearby villages in heavy ash.
Lava began flowing down the mountain’s flank and across homes and roads at around 4pm.
Eddy Sanchez, director of the country’s seismology and volcanology institute, said the flows reached temperatures of about 700°C.
Dramatic video footage showed a fast-moving lahar, or flow of pyroclastic material and slurry, slamming into and partly destroying a bridge on a highway between Sacatepequez and Escuintla.
“Not everyone was able to get out. I think they ended up buried,” Consuelo Hernandez, a resident of El Rodeo village, told the Diario de Centroamerica newspaper.
Homes were still burning in El Rodeo late on Sunday and a charred stench hung over the town.
Hundreds of rescue workers, including firefighters, police and soldiers, worked to help survivors and recover bodies amid the stillsmoking lava.
Firefighters said they had seen some people who were trapped, but roads were cut by pyroclastic flows and they could not reach them.
Amid darkness and rain, the res- cue effort was suspended until early yesterday morning, said municipal firefighters’ spokesman Cecilio Chacaj.
Guatemala’s disaster agency said 3,100 people had evacuated nearby communities, and ash fall from the eruption was affecting an area with about 1.7 million of country’s 15 million or so people.
Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales said he would issue a declaration of a state of emergency to be approved by Congress, and urged people to heed warnings from emergency officials.
Ash fell on the Guatemala City area as well as the departments of Sacatepequez, Chimaltenango and Escuintla, which are in south-central Guatemala around the volcano.
Aviation authorities closed the capital’s airport due to the danger posed to planes by the ash.
One of Central America’s most active volcanos, the Volcan de Fuego reaches an altitude of 3,763m above sea level at its peak.