Volcano in Colombia Erupts; Thousands Die : 20,000 May Be Victims of Mudslides

A volcano that had been rumbling to life for months erupted early Thursday, melting its snowcap and hurling down torrents of mud that buried four sleeping towns in an Andes mountain valley. Early estimates of the dead reached 20,000.

Blazing volcanic ash cascaded into the valleys Wednesday night. A few hours later, the mud avalanche crashed through the towns, which had a combined population of 70,000. Lava began flowing from the cone Thursday afternoon.

If the death toll equals the estimates, or climbs beyond them, the eruption of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano will rank as one of this century’s worst natural disasters.

No Longer Exists

The Lagunilla River became a rushing wall of mud that destroyed at least 85% of Armero, a farming town of 50,000 people 30 miles from the volcano and 105 miles northwest of Bogota.

“Armero doesn’t exist anymore,” Red Cross rescue worker Fernando Duque said in an interview from the scene on Todelar radio.

The three other devastated towns--Santuario, Carmelo and Pindalito--are on rivers west of the volcano and Armero.

President Belisario Betancur flew over the mud sea of Armero in a helicopter

He said in a broadcast later: “The situation is very grave. I appeal for the solidarity of all Colombians. . . . We don’t yet know the full scope of the tragedy.”

Caracol radio said the ash fall was so heavy at 1 p.m. Thursday that “it looked like nighttime.” It quoted national university geologists as saying the lava flow had begun, but they did not say how large it was or give its direction.

Climbed to Safety

A civil defense spokesman, Maj. Hugo Ardila, told a midday news conference in Bogota that about 10,000 people had been found alive in Armero up to that time.

There were reports of ash being blown 250 miles northeast and east of Bogota.

The Colombian survivors climbed trees, clung to roofs above the mud and huddled behind a sturdy concrete cemetery wall that didn’t fall.

One of them, Edeliberto Nieto, told the Bogota radio chain IRCN: “We heard a frightening noise, and then a blast of wind hit us and we saw fire falling from the sky. It was horrible, so horrible! My wife was killed. My mother was killed. My little girl who would have been 4 years old tomorrow died. One of my sisters was killed and one of my little nephews.”

Marina Franco de Huez told the radio: “The ash rain increased and the whole world began to scream. I woke up my daughter and we ran out to one of the streets around the cemetery. More than half of the population was buried under a torrent of mud that came with a horrible noise. It dragged houses, cattle, tree stumps and gigantic rocks. The church was buried, the school, the theater.”

Ambulances and rescue workers had trouble reaching the town because the avalanche destroyed the highway and five bridges leading to it, Caracol radio said, quoting civil defense workers.

“Some of the bodies had been under mud for six hours when we dug them out. We weren’t even able to tell if they were men or women. They were just a mass of gray,” Duque said.

There was no late, accurate count of the number of bodies recovered.

The Defense Ministry said 21 of the most seriously injured people pulled from the mud in Armero arrived on a military plane in Bogota on Thursday night.

Mud 5 Yards Deep

“The mass of mud is up to five yards high in some areas. Some people were able to escape and climb over walls that weren’t covered by the avalanche and were rescued with the help of ropes and horses,” said Paul Ramirez, a reporter for Todelar radio, who was among the first on the scene.

“Rescue workers are talking about 20,000 dead,” Red Cross director Artemo Franco said on Caracol radio. “It is an immense tragedy.”

“Eighty-five percent of the town is destroyed, and we estimate there are 15,000 deaths,” Gov. Eduardo Alzate of Tolima state, which includes Armero, told Caracol.

The last great eruption with casualties and damage of the magnitude that appeared to be emerging in the Andes was in 1902 at Mt. Pelee on the Caribbean island of Martinique. It killed 29,000 people.

Rains Added to Flood

Heavy rains began about the time the 17,716-foot mountain erupted, gorging the river with more water, the Caracol radio said.

Fernando Rivera, a crop-dusting pilot who flew over the devastated area, said the mud avalanche also destroyed the villages of Santuario, Carmelo and Pindalito, which had a total population of about 20,000.

He said that the mud buried farmhouses for 25 miles along the river.

“Some survivors were clinging to trees they had climbed, some were on roofs that weren’t reached by the mud, and even some (were) in a cemetery that had a cement wall around it and that the mud did not knock down,” Rivera said.

“There’s nothing but a sea of mud in Armero. All you can see are the roofs of the houses in parts of the town.”

Concrete Block Buildings

The town’s tallest building is the Catholic cathedral, whose steeple rises about three stories. Most buildings are of one story, with a few of two stories, and nearly all are made of concrete blocks.

Other towns along the Lagunilla were closer to the volcano, but apparently were spared because they sit on hills.

Chinchina, which has a population of about 70,000 and is only six miles from the base of Nevado del Ruiz, escaped major damage, but some houses on the hillside below the town were destroyed.

Various reports said the volcano started spewing ash and smoke at 10:30 p.m. Wednesday, and the mud hit Armero about three hours later.

Smoke at 26,000 Feet

“Smoke was reaching us at 26,000 feet,” Pilot Fernando Cervera told Caracol radio. “The cabin of the plane was filled with smoke and I had to ask the passengers to use oxygen masks. The flames that shot out of the volcano were huge.”

He continued to Cali, 25 minutes from Bogota.

Dr. Darrell Herd, deputy chief of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Office of Earthquakes, Volcanoes and Engineering in Reston, Va., said the volcano spewed steam and ash Sept. 11 and there has been almost continuous activity since then.

Nevado del Ruiz reawakened at the end of last year, with a series of strong earthquakes on Dec. 22. After that it averaged about 35 earthquakes a month.

Herd said the activity was similar to that in March and April, 1980, at Mt. St. Helens in Washington state before the catastrophic eruption of May 18, 1980. Herd said the earlier eruptions at Nevado del Ruiz had been “literally clearing out the volcano’s throat,” by spewing old ash.