(If Eruption Imminent) Farmers To Be ‘Forcibly’ Evicted From Mayon Danger Zone

Agence France-Presse
Last updated 09:48pm (Mla time) 07/19/2006

LEGAZPI CITY -- A disaster official said on Wednesday that farmers still within the seven-kilometer (4.2 mile) danger zone declared around the crater of restive Mayon Volcano in Albay province would be “forcibly” removed from the area if and when volcanologists determine that an explosive eruption is imminent.

"We are worried about the people who remain in the permanent danger zone. There are livestock in there as well," said regional disaster coordinating council official Angel Capili after surveying Mayon from the air early Wednesday.

Rescue officials on Wednesday warned farmers to leave the fertile slopes of the volcano as it spewed lava for a fifth straight day amid fears of a major eruption.

The farmers work on the lower slopes of the cone-shaped, 2,462-meter (8,077-foot) central Philippines mountain thought at risk of an explosive eruption and whose lava flow has lengthened to about three kilometers (1.8 miles).

Capili did not estimate the number of people who remain within the danger zone.

No evacuations have been ordered outside the zone, but volcanologist Ed Laguerta told Agence France-Presse an explosive eruption could threaten the lives or properties of up to 70,000 people, including residents on the outskirts of Legazpi city.

Mayon's mild eruption continued at dawn Wednesday, marked by a fiery shower of lava fragments that fell up to four kilometers (2.4 miles) below the crater.

"Seismic activity apparently resumed to high levels," suggesting lava extrusion and rock falls, the government's seismology institute said in its latest advisory.

"At this stage Mayon continues its mild eruption with little or no explosions," it said.

"The public however is reminded that explosions are still very possible and the probability of life-threatening pyroclastic flows resulting from an explosive eruption remains high."

These flows refer to superheated dust and rocks that travel down a volcano's flanks at great speeds during an explosive eruption.

Mayon, about 300 kilometers (176 miles) southeast of Manila, is one of 22 active volcanoes in the Philippines.

It has erupted 47 times in recorded history, including in 1814, when it buried the town of Cagsawa killing an estimated 1,000 residents. Mayon's most recent major eruption was in 2001.

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