A few years ago, in 2011, for example, a very concerned second cousin wrote to me because he had just found out that the level of activity of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano was yellow. I answered that yes, of course, that it had been like this for several years. More or less 20. He had just read that information from Bogotá, and the cousin who lives in Manizales, 30 kilometers from the volcano —me—, was in imminent risk. I reassured him by telling him that, in any case, yes, we live with an active volcano.
In 1985, when the volcano erupted that killed 25,000 people, I was in fifth grade. That day my dad didn’t get me up to go to school, he canceled classes, and as the day progressed we learned about the devastation left by the rivers of mud and lahars that ended up in Armero, Tolima, and Chinchiná, Caldas. But in Manizales nothing happened. Apart from an excess of ash, life went on as normal, and I remembered my grandmother, a few days before, wisely pointing out that no drunk vomits into the knot of his tie.
The Colombian Geological Service announced that we are once again at the orange activity level. In the last 40 years, the volcano has been at this level four times: in 1985, in 1989, and twice in 2012. It is not unprecedented, but this change in the level of activity means that the probability of a volcanic eruption increases by months. or weeks, to weeks or days. The change occurs because the signals that experts monitor have increased significantly. The earthquakes inside the volcano are close to 12,000 events per day, associated with rock fracturing. Ash emission has increased, and so has the temperature. That there is heating up.
Now imagine a milk that is about to boil and suddenly the flame is turned off. It is what can happen. and hopefully
Living with a volcano is that. Activate protocols, update and socialize the evacuation routes, walk the banks of the rivers that are born in the volcano to verify that there is no new person living there who is not aware of or included in the call circuits, prohibit entry to the National Park Natural los Nevados, restrict tourism, limit the circulation of vehicles around the volcanic system, think about virtualizing the classes of students who live in the area of influence closest to the volcano, consider whether we better close the airport, prepare all hospitals preventively , install a permanent unified command post, ask people to stop sharing WhatsApp chains, consult with this one and with the other one, notify everyone, notify, review, point out, insist, have resources, equipment, people, hoping nothing happens.
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What if it is scary to live so close to a volcano? That answer is not so simple. That is, every day you eat breakfast, check the news, talk to your friends, make plans to go out for a drink, work, do your things, go on with your life as if anything. But also every day you get up to see how the volcano woke up. In Manizales, many of us face this wonderful view of three snow-capped mountains on the central mountain range, and one of them is the Nevado del Ruiz volcano. You look at how big its fumarole is, you speculate if you see it gray and it is likely that ash will fall later, you take pictures of it, it is beautiful and powerful. You ask that this time, if it erupts, we have learned the lesson of 1985, and no one dies, please.
The most vulnerable people are those who live on the banks of the rivers that originate in the Nevado del Ruiz. There could be a repeat of what happened in 1985, when the eruption of the volcano melted the ice cap of the snow-capped mountain and all that water flowed down the Lagunilla, Claro and Molinos rivers, causing the tragedy that we all remember and whose consequences are still felt today. not only in the absence of the people who died, but also of the children who were lost in the disorder of a country that was not prepared for such a challenge. Nobody wants that to be repeated, and if you ask me, at the risk of being punished by history, I do believe that today we are better prepared.
The recommendation then is, for the people, to be well informed, for the authorities to communicate better, and for everyone to be ready, attentive, alert, prepared and calm. Because one is not born in vain at the foot of a volcano, as the musician Lucio Feuillet says.
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