About 4,000 residents have been evacuated from Guatemala’s Volcano of Fire as red-hot rock and ash spewed into the sky and cascaded down the slopes toward an area devastated by a deadly eruption earlier this year.
Guatemala’s volcanology unit said that explosions from the 12,300ft (3,763-meter) mountain shook homes with “constant sounds similar to a train locomotive”.
Incandescent material burst as high as 3,200ft above the crater and flows of hot rock and ash extended about 1.5 miles down one flank of the volcano. Hot blasts of pyroclastic material pushed down canyons on the slopes, while ash drifted toward Guatemala City to the east.
Hundreds of families heeded the call of disaster coordination authorities to evacuate 10 communities, piling into yellow school buses for trips to shelters. The national disaster commission said 3,925 people had been evacuated by early Monday.