Volcano Eruption, Mount Merapi | featured news

Searing gas avalanched down an Indonesian volcano with a thunderous roar, torching houses and trees and incinerating villagers as they fled Mount Merapi's worst eruption in a century. Dozens of bodies found Friday raised the death toll to 122.

For 33 years, Maridjan spoke to Mount Merapi, believing he could appease its unpredictable spirits by throwing offerings of rice, clothes and chickens into the volcano's gaping crater.

Indonesia's Mount Merapi erupted on Thursday for the second time in a week, blasting vast plumes of ash into the sky, as the death toll from the initial eruption and a tsunami that hit remote western islands reached 377.

Rescuers battled rough seas Tuesday to reach remote Indonesian islands pounded by a 10-foot tsunami that swept away homes, killing at least 113 people... Also Tuesday, the country's most volatile volcano, Mount Merapi, 800 miles to the east, started to erupt at dusk as scientists warned that pressure building beneath its lava dome could trigger one of the most powerful blasts in years.