Tonga’s volcano sinks into sea after eruption
Print Edition
A VOLCANO that exploded on the Pacific island nation of Tonga has almost disappeared from view, new images revealed yesterday, with swathes of the country smothered in grey dust or damaged by a tsunami.
The volcano erupted 30 kilometers into the air on Saturday and deposited ash, gas and acid rain across a large area of the Pacific.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said three people were killed, citing Tonga’s government.
Three days after the eruption, the outside world is still struggling to understand the scale of the disaster using patchy satellite phone connections, surveillance flights and satellite images.
While power and local phone systems had been partially restored, international communications remain severed.
But the World Health Organization said in a statement yesterday that its liaison officer in Tonga, Dr Yutaro Setoya, was “channeling communication between UN agencies and the Tongan government.”
“With international phone lines and Internet connectivity still down, Dr Setoya’s satellite phone is one of the few ways to get information,” WHO said.
The officer has “literally been standing outside from dawn until long into the night for the past few days to ensure that the phone can reach the satellite signal,” said WHO’s Health Cluster Coordinator for the Pacific, Sean Casey.
The UN health agency said around 100 houses had been damaged, with 50 destroyed on Tonga’s main island of Tongatapu.
Around 2 centimeters of ash and dust had fallen on Tongatapu, it said on Twitter, “raising concerns of air pollution and potential contamination of food & water supplies.”
“The gov’t has advised the public to remain indoors, use masks if going out & to drink bottled water due to the ashfall,” the WHO tweeted.
Satellite images released by Maxar Technologies yesterday showed that where most of the volcanic structure stood above sea level a few days ago, there is now just open sea.
Only two relatively small volcanic islands were still visible above sea level after the eruption.
New Zealand released aerial images taken from a surveillance flight the previous day, revealing a tree-lined coast transformed from green to grey by the volcanic fallout.
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