Islanders rescued after Alaskan volcano erupts
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) -- A fishing vessel rescued 10 people after a volcano erupted, sending rocks and ash down on a cattle ranch on a remote island in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska.
This 2007 photo shows the 3,500-foot Okmok Caldera volcano and its 6-mile-wide circular crater.
The Tara Gaila picked up the people Saturday evening after receiving an urgent call from the Coast Guard. The fishing vessel brought them to Dutch Harbor about 65 miles away, where they were staying at a hotel on Sunday.
No injuries were reported, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Levi Read.
Lonnie Kennedy, who lives on Umnak Island at the base of the 3,500-foot volcano with members of his family and a couple of ranch hands, said all seemed normal until late Saturday morning.
"We heard something that sounded like thunder and went outside and right away realized it wasn't thunder. It sounded like huge rocks rolling or something," he said. "I told everyone it sounds like the volcano is blowing up and we need a plan to get out of here."
Kennedy said they were able to get an emergency call out to the Coast Guard requesting help.
He said he then used a small helicopter to fly people, one or two at a time, to Unalaska Island six miles away. He said the ash started falling so heavily that he was unable to fly one ranch hand and one of his sons across.
"You could see no daylight in any direction. It was pitch black," he said. "I was scared."
The Tara Gaila arrived and picked up the two on Umnak Island and then those on Unalaska Island. The family and the ranch hands arrived in Dutch Harbor at 3 a.m. Sunday.
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When the Coast Guard got the call for help Saturday, it sent two cutters to Umnak Island, located in the western Aleutians about 860 miles southwest of Anchorage, but recalled them after the Tara Gaila responded to the emergency call. It also sent a helicopter but it had to land in Dutch Harbor because of the falling ash.
The Okmok Caldera, which consists of a 6-mile-wide circular crater about 1,600 feet deep, erupted with little warning Saturday morning, just hours after seismologists at the Alaska Volcano Center began detecting a series of small tremors.
The explosion flung a large ash plume into the sky.
The volcano erupted at 11:43 a.m. and reached peak activity about two hours later, said Cyrus Read, a geophysicist with the Alaska Volcano Observatory, which has several seismic stations on the Okmok Caldera. The Okmok Caldera contains more than a dozen volcanic cones. Scientists weren't sure which cone exploded Saturday.
One of the observatory's seismic stations that was placed at the rim of the volcano likely was destroyed in the explosion, Read said. Several others stations were functioning Sunday.
"It continues at this time," Read said. "It is a pretty solid plume."
Trace amounts of ash were being reported in Dutch Harbor on Saturday. There were no new reports of ash falling in the large fishing port.
Ash was expected to continue drifting south. The ash cloud was estimated at 45,000 feet on Sunday and posed a risk to aircraft.
PenAir, which serves southwest Alaska, said it was forced to cancel two flights between Dutch Harbor and Anchorage on Saturday but things had returned to normal on Sunday.
The last time the volcano -- formed about 2,000 years ago -- erupted was in 1997, and it was active for eight months, Read said. But he said there was no way of knowing how long the eruption would last this time.
Kennedy, 46, who grew up in Cordes Junction, Arizona, said he plans to go back to the island with his family as soon as it is safe.
"I've always been a cowboy all my life," he said. "It doesn't bother me. It probably won't blow up again for a long time."
There have been daily earthquakes ranging from 1.5 to 3.6 in this area for the last month or so.