JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian authorities are searching for several hundred tourists after Mount Barujari on Lombok island spewed a massive column of ash into the atmosphere and have evacuated more than 1,100 others, the country’s disaster agency said Wednesday. More than 1,000 tourists including 639 foreigners were in Mount Rinjani National Park when Barujari, a smaller volcano within Mount Rinjani, began erupting on Tuesday, sending a plume of ash into the sky which fell back to coat vegetation. Nugroho said government scientists have declared a danger zone of 3 kilometers (1.6 miles) around the crater and raised the volcano’s alert to the third highest level, but some tourists did not immediately heed warnings to leave because they wanted to take photos or videos of the eruption. The eruption interrupted flights for several hours at Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali, about 135 kilometers (84 miles) from Lombok, and Selaparang airport in Mataram, the capital of West Nusa Tenggara province, located on Lombok Island. Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, an area of high seismic and volcanic activity which is home to more than 400 volcanoes, including at least 129 that are still active and 65 qualified as dangerous.
Indonesia authorities evacuate over 1,000 tourists from the island of Lombok after Mount Barujari erupts.