Volcanic activity at Mount Agung remains high.
Two eruptions were recorded on Sunday with ash columns reaching a height of 1,500 meters above the surface of the crater.
Some villages in Karangasem were reportedly exposed to moderate-intensity ash fall, resulting from the eruptions. A tweet from Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the spokesman for the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) shows images of the ash fall.
Daerah yang terpapar hujan abu Gunung Agung yaitu Desa Bhuana Giri, Desa Pidpid, Desa Tista, Desa Nawa Kerti, Desa Datah, sebagian Desa Ababi, sebagian di Desa Abang, Desa Kertha Mandala dan Wilayah Kota Amlapura dan sekitarnya. Bandara aman dan tetap beroperasi normal. pic.twitter.com/9Phj5zzAcY
— Sutopo Purwo Nugroho (@Sutopo_PN) July 15, 2018
The volcano persists as a level III or “standby” alert status, the second highest of four levels.
There continues to be an exclusion zone encompassing a four-kilometer radius from the volcano crater.
Outside of this exclusion zone, Bali remains safe and tourists are urged by the government to still come for holiday. The main thing that could impact tourists is if ash from an eruption enters the airport’s flight path and causes flight cancellations or a airport shutdown—which happened last month.
Indonesias’s volcanology center (PVMBG) advises people to stay outside of the danger zone, while visitors and/or tourists are prohibited from climbing the volcano for the time being.
PVMBG also warns people living downstream of the volcano to be prepared for the potential threat of cold lava flows, ash-filled, debris-collective flows that are intensified with rainfall.
Before Sunday’s eruptions, Mount Agung previously let out a spectacular Strombolian Eruption on the evening of July 2.
Meanwhile, thousands of local villagers are still evacuated, with data from the Karangasem Regional Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD) recording about 3,500 people spread across 51 refugee points.
Life as an evacuee is nothing new for these people, with Mount Agung becoming active nearly a year ago (after not erupting since 1963). With the volcano going from high alert to standby and back up several times, local residents have returned home and evacuated multiple times since Mount Agung started rumbling again last year.
“The current evacuees are in good condition because each village head has coordinated this and is doing well,” Pasebaya chairman Gede Pawana said on Monday, as quoted by Liputan6. Pasebaya is a community made up of leaders from local villages focusing on Mount Agung mitigation activities.
Some evacuees choose to go home in the mornings to take care of their cattle and crops, but return to their evacuation camps at night where they feel more safe to sleep, Pawana explained.
