It was dark, but she could hear her husband yelling to her to try to grab onto a tree to stay afloat.Ī moment later, she said, a huge tree crashed into her and swept her away.
When she came to the surface, she said, the lights of the town had been knocked out. The baby was knocked out of my husband's arms, and we were all separated.'' ''We got about a block,'' she said, ''and a big wave of mud hit us. Hortensia Oliveros, who is 19 years old and in her eighth month of pregnancy, said she heard screams, woke her mother, husband and 11-month-old daughter, and raced into the street with them. Many said they had been sleeping and were jolted awake by the screams of neighbors.
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Some told of hearing a tremendous roar as the torrent of water, mud, stones and trees bore down on the town. Some of the survivors, bloodied and caked with mud and trembling in shock, were brought to the hospital here. Several hundred people had clustered on one piece of high ground and were being rescued by helicopter. The corrugated tin roofs of the houses seemed to float on a sea of mud. It had swept across the town, on the banks of the Lagunilla River 30 miles east of the volcano, totally submerging the eastern section and rising to the eaves of scores of houses. Two months ago, residents in the area said, the volcano began emitting smoke, and for three days it spewed ashes over several communities.Ī reporter in a light plane over Armero this afternoon saw a vast fan of dark gray mud. The avalanches of mud and water began soon afterward. President Betancur had refused to negotiate with the rebels and broke the siege with repeated assaults by armored cars and troops with heavy weapons and explosives.Īuthorities in Bogota said there were two eruptions, one late Wednesday afternoon and a second of greater intensity at about 9 P.M. The volcano disaster occurred one week after a 28-hour siege by leftist rebels at the Palace of Justice in Bogota, in which about 100 people, including 11 of the country's 24 Supreme Court Justices, were killed. ''We have had one tragedy after another,'' Mr. In a television interview tonight, he described the ravages of the volcano as an ''immeasurable tragedy.'' Colombia's President, Belisario Betancur, spent most of the day flying over the devastated area in a helicopter. He also said the eruptions had come as Colombians were trying to prepare an emergency plan to deal with such a disaster. Herd said extensive lava flows from Andean volcanoes are uncommon because the lava from them is thick. Herd, an American vulcanologist who wrote his doctoral dissertation in 1974 on Nevada del Ruiz, said the disaster, in terms of deaths, injuries and property damage, ''will rank as one of the worst.'' But in terms of volcanic violence, he added, ''if 10 is the worst, I suspect this will be a 5 or a 6.''ĭr.
Spanish explorers recorded the last known eruption of the volcano in 1595. The United Nations Disaster Relief Organization said it had information that 4,000 bodies had been recovered.Īn official of the hospital in Armero estimated that at least 90 percent of the town, six miles south of here, had been destroyed. But Artemo Franco, a regional Red Cross director who spent most of the day visiting the stricken area, said, ''We're talking about 20,000 dead.'' Eduardo Alzate, the Governor of Tolima state, which encompasses the disaster area, said at least 15,000 people had died. The mud slides poured into surrounding rivers, causing three to overflow.Įstimates of the death toll varied. There were also unconfirmed reports that three or more villages in the area had disappeared under the tons of mud and rocks loosened by the heat of the eruptions. Authorities said the floods had buried most of the town of Armero, population 25,000, and devastated much of Chinchina, with 70,000 people. Towering walls of mud swept through the valleys surrounding the 16,200-foot Nevada del Ruiz volcano, 85 miles northwest of Bogota. A snow-capped volcano in northern Colombia that had not erupted in nearly 400 years came to life overnight in a brilliant, explosive burst, touching off floods of raging water and mud that officials feared had swept at least 15,000 people to their deaths.