OK, where's the live cam. Don't these volcanoes know they have to get in line?

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/225/world/Ecuadoran_volcano_spews_column:.shtml

Ecuadoran volcano spews column of ash three miles high, covering Andean landscape

By Associated Press, 8/13/2001 19:23

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) Ecuador's Tungurahua volcano spewed a column of ash more than three miles into the sky Monday, capping days of smaller eruptions, authorities said.

Local television broadcast images of mountain pastures, farmland, sheep and cows covered by silty gray ash in areas north and west of the volcano.

Indira Molina, of Ecuador's Geophysics Institute, told local radio station Sonorama that the eruption began shortly after dawn.

She described it as part of a cycle of activity that has occurred roughly every six months since the 16,553-foot Tungurahua rumbled back to life in late 1999 after decades of inactivity.

Volcanologist Patricia Mothes said ash from Tungurahua, located about 88 miles from the capital, Quito, would diminish in the coming days.

There were no reports of people killed or injured since a series of eruptions began Aug. 4, but local farmers said ashfall on grazing land was forcing them to move with their livestock to other areas. No official evacuation had been ordered by the government.

-- Anonymous, August 14, 2001

Answers

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/227/world/Ecuador_declares_state_of_em er:.shtml

Ecuador declares state of emergency for areas hit by volcano ash

By Associated Press, 8/15/2001 11:42

QUITO, Ecuador (AP) The government declared a state of emergency late Tuesday for rural zones affected by ash eruptions from the Tungurahua volcano.

President Gustavo Noboa instructed the public works, health, housing, and agriculture ministries to send medicine, equipment and manpower to areas hit by the ash fall, a government communique said.

Ecuador's Civil Defense said more then 23,000 people have been affected by the ash, which in some places is 2 inches deep. More than 88,900 acres of crops have been blanketed. An undetermined number of sheep, cows and other farm animals have died.

Damage has been estimated at about $6 million. No one has been reported killed or injured and no evacuations have been ordered.

The emergency decree covers seven communities in the Tungurahua and Chimborazo provinces north and west of the volcano, which started spewing ash on Aug. 4.

The 16,553-foot-high Tungurahua, 84 miles south of the capital, Quito, rumbled back to life in 1999 after eight decades of inactivity.

The latest eruptions have not directly affected Banos, a tourist town 4 miles northeast of the crater. The 17,000 inhabitants were forced to evacuate in October 1999, but began trickling back into town late last year.

-- Anonymous, August 15, 2001