JAKARTA, Indonesia — A volcano in western Indonesia, which spewed hot lava and sand high into the sky early yesterday in its first eruption in 400 years, erupted again today, spewing white clouds of smoke and ash more than 2,000 yards into the air, officials and witnesses said.
Thousands of people living along the slopes of Mount Sinabung in North Sumatra province have been evacuated to emergency shelters, mosques, and churches, said a spokesman for the National Disaster Management Agency. Their abandoned villages and crops are blanketed in heavy, gray soot....
Mount Sinabung last erupted in 1600, so observers don’t know the volcano’s eruption pattern and are monitoring it closely for more activity....
Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago, is on the so-called Ring of Fire, an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.
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