Friday, May 20, 2011
On May 20, 1919 Kelud Volcano in East Java, Indonesia, violently erupts killing approximately 5,000 people. The large volume of the volcano’s crater-lake causes water to be ejected from the volcano within seconds of the eruption. Victims are quickly overcome by the massive hot mudflows (lahars) that descend the volcano. Located on the “Pacific Ring of Fire,” Kelut has erupted approximately 30 times since A.D. 1000.
Earlier this month, the Indonesian government announced a $158 million plan to relocate 13,000 survivors of Indonesia’s last deadly eruption—Mount Merapi in October 2010—who are still living in temporary shelters. Over 300 people were killed and some 200,000 were evacuated in eruptions that lasted for a month. The archipelago of Indonesia, home to nearly 246 million people, has at least 129 active volcanoes, with 68 of them classified as “dangerous.”
