Mt. Bromo volcano begins to spew ash
Mt. Bromo volcano begins to spew ash
JAKARTA (JP): The 2,392-meter Mt. Bromo volcano in East Java
has been closed to tourists as ash was constantly spewing from
its crater, officials said on Sunday.
Widely known as a scenic tourist attraction, the mountain
began to spew ash on Wednesday, with the wind now carrying it as
far as the neighboring towns of Probolinggo, Pasuruan, Malang,
Sidoarjo and parts of the East Java capital of Surabaya.
"The mixture of rain and ash have left the roads to Bromo very
muddy and slippery. To prevent possible accidents, the area is
being temporarily closed for tourism-related activities," said
First Sgt. Teguh Sudarwadi of the Sukapura Police subprecinct,
the closest police station to the volcano which is some 18
kilometers away.
"The ash has been causing us eye and nose irritations, but so
far local residents have been able to go about their normal
business," the officer told The Jakarta Post by phone.
He said the ash blanketed the ground to a depth of two
centimeters every morning.
"We are collaborating with the local government just in case
the situation gets worse," Teguh said.
The spewing ash has also forced farmers living at the foot of
Mr. Bromo to harvest hundreds of hectares of fruit and crops
early.
"We're hoping to save the crops and, fortunately, the amount
of ash falling has lessened recently," Karmidi, a local from
Ngadisari village told the Post by phone.
"We have no other choice but to harvest our cabbage and apple
crops early as the ash has covered them, otherwise we would
suffer greater losses," a Sukapura farmer, Hartono, told Antara.
Bromo, located on a sand plateau of the Tengger mountain range
and part of the Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park, has been off-
limits to tourists since Wednesday.
"There has been no decision made as yet to step up the alert
status (of the volcano) to a red alert," Sarmin, an official from
the national park, said as quoted by Antara.
Bromo last spewed ash on March 3, 1995.
The news agency also quoted a Tengger shaman Soedja'i as
saying that the residents were still staying in their villages,
preparing for the upcoming Karo Day, a traditional festival which
falls on Dec. 16.
"On this day, people provide traditional food and visit each
other following the Sodoran ritual. As far as I remember, the
last times the mountain spewed ash were in 1995, 1982 and 1948,"
Soedja'i said.
There is no official registration of population in the Tengger
mountain area, but according to national park data, there are
over 128,000 people living on the 58,800 hectares of the Bromo
National Park. Most of them are farmers.
They live in groups in the hills of Tengger and Semeru
mountains at altitudes of between 1,000 meters and 3,676 meters,
where the average minimum temperature is between three and 18
degrees Celcius. (edt)