SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Volcanoes that have been quiet for decades are collapsing in the eastern Caribbean, prompting officials to issue alerts in Martinique and St. Louis. Vincent and the Grenadines, while scientists are in a hurry to study the activity they say they have not been observed for years.
The latest warning was issued late Tuesday for the La Soufrière volcano in St. Petersburg. Vincent and the Grenadines, a chain of islands that hosts over 100,000 people. Officials reported tremors, strong gas emissions, the formation of a new volcanic dome and changes to its crater lake.
The Caribbean Disaster Management Agency said scientists noticed an “effusive eruption inside the crater on Tuesday, with visible gas and steam.”
The government has warned those living near the volcano to prepare to evacuate if necessary, declaring an orange alert which means the eruptions could occur with less than 24 hours’ notice.
La Soufriere, located near the northern tip of the main island of St. Vincent, last erupted in 1979, and a previous eruption in 1902 killed about 1,600 people. This took place shortly before Mount Martinique. The bullets erupted and destroyed the city of Saint-Pierre, killing more than 30,000 people.
Mt. And Pelee is active again. In early December, officials in French Caribbean territory issued a yellow alert due to seismic activity under the mountain. It was the first such alert issued since the last volcano eruption in 1932, Fabrice Fontaine told the Associated Press, along with Martinique’s Volcanological and Seismological Observatory.
While the eastern Caribbean is a long chain of active and extinct volcanoes, volcanologist Erik Klemetti of Denison University in Ohio said the activity at Mt. Pelee and La Soufriere are not related.
“It doesn’t look like a volcano is starting to erupt that others will,” he said. “It falls into the category of coincidence.”
He said the activity is evidence that magma lurks underground and leaks to the surface, although he added that scientists still do not have a very good understanding of what controls how fast this happens.
“The answers are not entirely satisfactory,” he said. “Science is still being researched.”
Klemetti said the most active volcano in recent years in the eastern Caribbean was the Soufriere Hills in Montserrat, which has erupted continuously since 1995, destroying the capital Plymouth and killing at least 19 people in 1997.
Seventeen of the 19 living volcanoes in the eastern Caribbean are on 11 islands, the rest of the two are underwater near the island of Grenada, including one called Kick ‘Em Jenny which has been active in recent years.