Indonesia's Mount Merapi Volcano Erupts
Posted: Tue Mar 03, 2020 4:03 am
Mount Merapi spews volcanic material into the air in Sleman, Indonesia, Tuesday, March 3, 2020. Indonesia's most active volcano erupted Tuesday, spewing sand and pyroclastic material and sending massive smoke-and-ash column into the sky.
Indonesia's Mount Merapi volcano erupted Tuesday, sending a massive cloud of ash high into the air over Java island and shut down a nearby airport.
The country's volcano agency has issued a warning for residents to stay out of a 3.5 kilometer exclusion zone around Mount Merapi. The massive cloud caused by the eruption reached as high as 6,000 meters into the sky, forcing authorities to temporarily shut down the international airport in the city of Solo.
The volcano is Indonesia's most active. Tuesday's event was Mount Merapi's first major eruption since 2010, when more than 350 people were killed. The archipelago sits along the so-called "Ring of Fire," a series of geological fault lines in the Pacific Ocean that makes it prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity.