1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

As a result of Indonesia geographically located directly on top of the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, the country is home to over 100 active volcanoes. On October 26, 2010, Indonesia's most active volcano for the first time in history erupted with an uncharacteristic blast of hot ashes reaching a kilometer and a half into the sky. Mount Merapi is an active stratovolcano usually known to be non-explosive and attributed with slow eruptions since the 1500s and as it still did in 2006. The explosion, a day immediately after the experts raised the alert level to its highest, warning the surrounding population to move to safer grounds, was still unexpected as it was atypical of the behavior of "fire mountain". Ten days after it's initial eruption, a bigger and deadly blast was witnessed taking lives even outside denoted danger zones and wiping out hamlets and surrounding villages within the path of its pyroclastic flows.

***

Indonesia's Mount Merapi spews massive hot clouds of volcanic ash and rocks seen from Klaten district, Yogyakarta. As a result of Indonesia geographically located directly on top of the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, the country is home to over 100 active volcanoes. On October 26, 2010, Indonesia’s most active volcano for the first time erupted with an uncharacteristic direct vertical blast of hot ashes reaching a kilometer and a half into the sky.