Posted 16 May 2006 @ 07:17
Updated 16 May 2006 @ 07:19
YOGYAKARTA, 16 May 2006 - Indonesia's President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will visit Mount Merapi, which has been spewing lava and superheated gas for days, to convince residents to evacuate the area as some villagers prefer to stay and offer prayers to ward off a full eruption. "It's the government's task to provide facilities so that people can evacuate themselves or be evacuated,'' presidential spokesman Andi Mallarangeng said in an interview. "Still, President Yudhoyono respects the local myth, the local wisdom.''
Some villagers living nearest to the volcano choose to stay because of their beliefs and to tend to their cattle and crops, said Hadi Kuswoyo, a spokesman for the Indonesian Red Cross. Ash rain from the volcano has extended 13 kilometers (8 miles) north of the volcano, said Triani, an officer on duty at the Volcano Development and Research Center in Yogyakarta city. The lava dome has reached a height of about 85 meters (280 feet) over the past two weeks, Triani said. Lava dome collapses can set off pyroclastic flows, or the superheated flow of molten rock, ash and gases.
"The biggest problem the Indonesians face is getting the local people to believe what the scientists are saying,'' said James F. Luhr, director of the Global Volcanism Program at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. "People don't seem to trust the government, they have their own way of dealing with this. But that holds the possibility of some real disaster.''
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