PANIC: In the middle of the dark night, families with small children have fled Goma. The volcano has previously claimed many lives in Goma. Foto: HUGH KINSELLA CUNNINGHAM / EPA
––
Dramatic images show children and adults fleeing after the Nyiragongo volcano in Congo suddenly came to life on Saturday. Norwegian Tommy Rasmussen fears what will happen if they have to evacuate the 80 orphanage children into the jungle.
Updated less than 20 minutes ago
–
Outside the million-strong city of Goma in eastern Congo, the Nyiragongo volcano has come to life. According to Reuters, there is a great danger that the glowing lava will hit the city within a few hours.
It has created panic and sent thousands of people into exile. Shortly after the eruption started on Saturday night, the power went out in large parts of Goma. Volcanologist Dario Tedesco has reported heavy lava splashes from the crater. It reports Reuters.
– The situation is very confusing. The volcano can crack at the bottom, and the lava will then flow in the direction of Goma, where we have our orphanage. It has happened before, Tommy Rasmussen tells VG.
He is chairman of the board of New Chance, which since 2009 has run an orphanage for homeless children after the war in the Congo. At the orphanage in Mubambiro near Goma, a total of 80 children live.
The orphanage is built on lava, and is a reminder of how wrong it can go.
See the recent photos showing children and adults fleeing Goma late Saturday night:
– We are very worried
Rasmussen himself is in Norway, while he maintains close contact with the chairman of the board at the orphanage. He is worried about how the situation will develop in the next few hours. At the orphanage, the employees are now preparing to take the children with them and flee with 80 children in the middle of the night in unsafe areas.
– It is uncertain where it is safest to evacuate to. To the north is the volcano, to the west is the Masisi jungle, which is full of rebels, and to the east is Goma, from which everyone is now fleeing. So the choices are not optimal, Rasmussen explains and adds:
– We are very worried and need all the help we can get for the evacuation. If things go wrong now, we could lose the orphanage.
—-CONCERNED: Tommy Rasmussen has run an orphanage in Congo for many years. Now he fears that the orphanage may be taken by the lava eruption. Photo: Private
––
Rasmussen says that the monitoring of the Nyiragongo volcano has been stepped down in recent years due to lack of financial support, and that therefore no new activity in the volcano has been announced now.
– Usually you can barely see the light from the volcano from the orphanage, but now the whole sky is red, he says about the pictures he has been sent by board chairman Claude.
Deadly volcanic history
The last time Nyiragongo erupted was in January 2002, when hundreds of people died when large parts of eastern Goma were covered in lava and ash, and hundreds of thousands of people fled. As much as 80 percent of the city was destroyed as a result of the eruption then.
The deadliest outbreak occurred in 1977, when over 600 people lost their lives.
The Goma region, located in the province of North Kivu and bordering Rwanda and Uganda, has six volcanoes, all over 3,000 meters high.
–
