Indonesia’s most active volcano has erupted, sending a river of lava and gushing clouds of gas flowing 3,000 meters down its slopes.
The sounds of the eruption were heard 30 miles away, officials said. No casualties were reported.
It was the largest lava flow on Mount Merapi since authorities raised its level of danger in November, said Hanik Humaida, head of the Volcanological and Geological Risk Mitigation Center in the nearby city of Yogyakarta.
He said the lava dome of the volcano was growing rapidly, causing hot lava and gas clouds to flow down its slopes.
After the morning rain, the ash fall turned to mud in several villages. More than 150 people, mostly elderly, living less than 3 kilometers from the crater, were evacuated to barracks enabled for displaced people.
In November, authorities evacuated about 2,000 people living in the mountains in Magelang and Sleman districts, but most have returned.
The alert remains at the second highest level and authorities told people to stay out of a danger zone around the crater.
The 2,968-meter volcano on the densely populated island of Java is the most active of dozens of Indonesian volcanoes and has erupted repeatedly recently. The last major eruption of Merapi, in 2010, killed 347 people.
Indonesia, an archipelago of 270 million people, is prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity because it is located along the so-called “ring of fire” of the Pacific, a series of horseshoe-shaped seismic fault lines.