A mass evacuation of people from Ambae Island in Vanuatu is being planned due to volcanic ash fall making the island uninhabitable.
The Pacific nation of Vanuatu is planning a mass evacuation after a state of emergency was declared on Ambae island due to volcanic activity.
The island has become uninhabitable since the Manaro volcano began spewing ash and causing acid rain last month, Radio New Zealand (RNZ) reported, quoting a government spokesman.
“Families whose homes, water supplies and crops are damaged by the ash fall and acid rain will be evacuated to other islands,” newspaper Vanuatu Daily said.
The volcanic activity means residents’ “vegetation is affected, their water has been contaminated and people are struggling to get food from the garden because there’s been heavy ash fall on almost every part of Ambae,” the Ministry of Climate Change and Natural Disaster’s director general Jesse Benjamin told RNZ.
Last September, a major eruption of the volcano prompted the government to evacuate all 11,000 residents of Ambae island. They comprise about five per cent of Vanuatu’s population.
They returned home earlier this year, only for volcanic activity to begin again last month.
The residents will likely be evacuated to the nearby islands of Maewo and Pentecost.
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