Montserrat hit again
Publication: Daily Nation
Date: Wed, Aug 6, 1997
Page: 3A
Byline: Terry Ally
HUNDREDS of residents were evacuated yesterday from Montserrat's central region as the Soufriere Hills Volcano pelted the island with ash and debris and fires raged in the abandoned capital of Plymouth.
Sirens had pierced the night Monday warning Montserratians to quickly evacuate the Central Zone, previously considered safe, as fiery flows spilled from the crater of Langs Soufriere in all directions.
The bulk went straight to the capital, chewing up another two to three kilometres of the city.
"We were concerned because we saw material going down the river valley to the centre of the island," Deputy Chief Scientist Dr. Jill Norton said. "So, we evacuated the central zone which we were expecting to do if the level of activity reached this state."
About 1 000 people were evacuated from Old Towne and Fritz in the Central Zone.
Norton and her fellow-scientists were among those quitting the area where their station, the Montserrat Volcano Observatory (MVO), was located.
Also in the Central Zone was the only habitable hotel, Vue Pointe, along with scores of homes and make-shift businesses, relocated from the ash-covered capital.
Norton said the latest eruption, of over three million cubic metres of pyroclastic material, was the largest in the last five days.
Starting with an explosion Monday morning, a swarm of earthquakes led to the eruption before sunset which sent an ash cloud soaring a couple thousand feet into the air over safe Northern Zone.
Dozens of people in the provisional capital, Salem, scampered for cover as it rained pebbles and debris.
Norton said that the Central Zone would remain a day-only zone as the activity, in 12-to-14- hour cycles, was occurring early morning and early evening - which would make evacuation more difficult.
A skeleton staff now mans the MVO which has a standby position to the north of the island.
"We have a contingency plan for the evacuation of the observatory, should it become necessary . . . . We are keeping a minimum number of people here, about four or five."
In the capital the buildings which housed the police and Government Headquarters were on fire yesterday.
The new hospital, built just before the 1995 awakening, was destroyed along with the port building and two bridges over Fort Ghut (Valley).
"The flows got extremely close to one of the bulk fuel storage tanks; and we expect that to go with the next flow," Norton said.
The six-stage alert has been replaced by a simple "volcano alert", and the island is now divided into three zones: the safe Northern Zone, the Central Zone, and the Exclusion Zone which takes in the entire southern half of the island.