JAKARTA – Indonesia kept multiple airports shut and moved some schools to remote classes on Monday, even as the Anak Krakatau eruption that grounded 2,300 flights and blanketed areas in volcanic ash showed signs of easing.
The 25-hour eruption, which sent lava shooting into the air and produced a blast heard as far as 700 kilometers (435 miles) away, ended Sunday, according to the country’s Geological Agency. Still, officials said the volcano remained active Monday, with moderate and sporadic eruptions, dark ash plumes and small earthquakes occurring near the site. Cloudy weather also limited direct visual monitoring of the volcanic activity.
AirNav Indonesia said testing detected volcanic ash in airspace over Jakarta and several other cities, leading authorities to keep eight airports closed until 6 p.m. Monday. They included four commercial airports operated by state-owned InJourney Airports: Soekarno-Hatta International Airport and Halim Perdanakusuma Airport in Jakarta, Husein Sastranegara Airport in West Java, and Radin Inten Airport in Lampung, at the southern end of Sumatra.
At the four InJourney-managed airports alone, the shutdown disrupted roughly 2,300 flights and affected 268,539 passengers, the company said.
The fallout from the eruption reached well beyond aviation. Authorities allowed schools in ash-affected areas, including Jakarta and the provinces of West Java, Banten and Lampung, to temporarily switch to online learning from home in an effort to limit students’ exposure to volcanic ash.
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“The probability of additional eruptions in the coming days remains high,” said Lana Saria, head of the Geology Agency. “The main hazards include volcanic bombs, heavy ashfall and possible lava flows if sustained eruptive activity resumes,” she said.
Anak Krakatau is a volcanic island in the Sunda Strait between Indonesia’s main Java and Sumatra islands. Its name means “child of Krakatau,” and the volcano is the offspring of the infamous Krakatau, whose monumental 1883 eruption triggered a period of global cooling.
An eruption of Anak Krakatau in 2018 caused a tsunami that killed at least 430 people in Sumatra and Java. Researchers believe volcanic activity triggered an underwater landslide and caused a large chunk of Anak Krakatau’s southwest slope to collapse and displace a large volume of water.
Indonesia has more than 120 active volcanoes and frequently experiences eruptions due to its location along the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” the ring of seismic faults around the Pacific Ocean where most global seismic activity occurs.
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