Ringside seat for fearful villagers as Canaries volcano spews fire
Residents of the Canary Island village of Tazacorte had a ringside seat but were shocked and unwilling onlookers on Friday, contemplating a too-close-for-comfort spectacular eruption of La Palma's Cumbre Vieja volcano.
"There's nothing beautiful about it," grumbled Jose Carlos Bautista Martin, a pensioner of 70 who looked on agog with fellow villagers as the volcano continued to spew waves of hot lava into the air.
"All it leaves behind is black, dark lava and an intense blaze which looks as if it will go on for ever, growling as if it were the very devil himself," he adds of the aeroplane-like cacophany accompanying an eruption which has wrought havoc and forced thousands from their homes.
Tazacorte port offers a perfect vantage point for spying the mouth of the volcano which dominates the island, a popular holiday destination, as well as the heaps of ash and lava cascading down to the sea hundreds of metres below its peak.
Even by Thursday experts estimated the debris had covered an area bigger than 25 football pitches, with concerns rising over worsening air quality in nearby residential areas since the eruption began on September 19, the volvano sending tongues of molten rock flowing out of its main cone.
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20211001-ringside-seat-for-fearful-villagers-as-canaries-volcano-spews-fire
