Word: ashli
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Despite that rapid and spontaneous outpouring, rescue work at Armero proceeded at a slow and frustrating pace. The torrential mudslides washed away roads and bridges, limiting efforts to deliver both rescuers and relief supplies. Foul weather and the continuing down pour of volcanic ash from the smoking mountain kept Colombian helicopters away from Armero until Thursday afternoon. Only on Friday could the U.S. fly in any of the big CH-47 Chinook helicopters, capable of evacuating dozens of people at a time. In the interim, only nine small helicopters, able to carry just a handful of victims each, had flown...
...cannon rounds like a bombardment, so loud that they could be heard for more than 30 leagues around the base. In the region there were two rivers, the Guali and the La-gunilla . . . both were flooded with melted snow. It didn't really seem like water, but masses of ash and soil, with such a pestilent odor of sulfur that it couldn't be tolerated even from afar...
...perform short-term divination, geologists examine a number of clues. Mild seismic activity in the area, rumblings or the emission of ash and gases are all harbingers of greater things to come. Changes in the snowcaps that cover tall volcanoes may also indicate trouble. In Iceland, for example, the sight of a sagging, snow-covered mountaintop, which indicates that hot magma is pushing upward and melting the ice cap, warns knowledgeable residents to head for safety. More sophisticated techniques include tiltmeters or laser ranging devices to detect deformations in the volcano cone, also caused by magma oozing upward. Seismometers...
...extent of the mudflows it generated. And at Nevado del Ruiz, warning signs had abounded since Dec. 22, 1984. At that time a series of earthquakes were detected, followed by 30 minutes of harmonic tremor. Mild tremors continued throughout the spring and summer, and on Sept. 11, ash spewed forth for seven hours, accompanied by a roaring sound and electrical discharges. But for all these red flags, experts were unable to pinpoint when the big boom would come, or even if it would. Lacking that precision, Colombia, perhaps reluctant to disrupt the lives of residents with a false alarm...
Until they can eye a volcano and declare with certainty that it is ready to burst, scientists will remember with a wince their warning nearly ten years ago about Soufrière, a volcano on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe that began to spout a heavy plume of ash. Goaded by the geologists' alarms, authorities evacuated more than 70,000 people from the area and kept them away for 3½ months. The result: the mountain continued to sputter smoke and cough volumes of ash for a while, but it never blew. --By Natalie Angier. Reported by Christine Gorman/New York and Charles...