Aid worker Mark Snelling is in quake-hit Indonesia with the British Red Cross. But the quake is not the only emergency in the region.

Thursday, June 9

"Come and look at this," the Indonesian Red Cross volunteer beckons me. I'm waiting for a meeting in front of the Klaten branch, and walk over to the corner where he's standing.

Turning into a lane running down the side of the building, a small crowd has gathered, standing perfectly still, looking up. On the horizon, the lower slopes of Mount Merapi are just about visible; above it, gargantuan plumes of gas, vapour and smoke billow into the morning sky.

I generally avoid using the word 'awesome', but it's the only one I can find. The meeting is promptly cancelled, I grab my interpreter, and we head off.

One gets accustomed to a certain level of risk in aid work, but there is still something unnerving about driving towards an active volcano. Especially this one; the name Merapi does, after all, mean Mountain of Fire.

It is one of 130 volcanoes that stretch around the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, an arc of tectonic fault lines encircling the basin of the Pacific Ocean from the west coast of the Americas right around through southeast Asia and on as far as New Zealand..

There's been volcanic activity here for about 400,000 years. Small eruptions occur every two to three years, and larger ones every 10 to 15 years. Not really something to be trifled with.

As we get closer, a long thickly smoldering trench of lava is visible running down its southern flank. The gas clouds, known as pyroclastic flows, float off menacingly in a westerly direction. I find out later they are calculated to have risen 300 metres into the air, reaching a maximum width of 5.5 km.

The 3,000-metre volcano - one of the world's most active - has been rumbling and spewing since mid-April. At least 15,000 have already fled to the relative safety of IDP camps.

"Bigger every day"

Since the earthquake it's become easy to forget that there are two humanitarian emergencies going on here. For all the drama of Merapi's steadily increasing activity, people seem to have somehow got used to it. Families sleep in the IDP camps, but many return to their homes during the day to work their fields.

Despite the government declaration of a 7 km exclusion zone around the summit of Merapi, some are now reportedly simply refusing to leave their homes. They don't want to move any more.

But given the size of today's episode, most people are not hanging around.

"It's getting bigger and bigger every day," says Mardi, 57, a farmer who fled his property this morning. "The earth was shaking and rocks were falling down the hill. I could see the lava clearly and there was lots of ash in the air."

According to government vulcanology reports, there have been almost 300 avalanches today alone.

Mardi decided enough was enough and joined his family at the Dompol camp just outside the exclusion zone, one of about 40 facilities that have been set up by local authorities supported by the Indonesian Red Cross.

Like so many Javanese, Mardi's daughter Maryanti, 27, is surprisingly sanguine. "The grown-ups are OK, but the children are afraid," she says. "My son is always crying." In nearby Kamalang camp, 19-year-old Tripurnati cleans her baby boy Riko with talcum powder. "We're afraid to stay at home, but life goes on."

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies has diverted aid supplies from the earthquake response, including tents and tarpaulins, to bolster the volcano operation.

What continues to frustrate operational planners, however, is the stark reality that Merapi's activities are almost impossible to predict.

Frayed nerves

The government of Indonesia has developed four scenarios from the least-case to the worst-case. There could be a full-scale eruption; the activity could also simply stop.

One of the more pressing concerns is a possible collapse of the lava dome, which has now reached a height of 112 metres, and is now holding approximately 4 million cubic metres of lava material. A sudden collapse would throw toxic gas and hot ash over a radius of several kilometres; ash and mud avalanches would travel yet further.

But authorities and humanitarian agencies are keen to avoid panic. Despite the very real dangers, contingency plans have been in place for weeks. Because Merapi is so active, it is also one of the world's most closely monitored.

The 'guardian of the volcano' - a venerated local elder appointed by the Sultan of Yogyakarta to communicate with the ancient Javanese spirits who they believe reside there - has assured the population that the sacred mountain means no harm and is only providing fertility to the soil. "Merapi is doing a good thing," one local resident tells me.

Nevertheless, the looming threat is fraying the nerves of a population already traumatised by the earthquake two weeks ago, which is thought by scientists to have triggered some of the increased volcanic activity.

"Our main job is to calm the people who are afraid," says Andik Joko, an Indonesian Red Cross volunteer working in one of the camps. Under the worst-case eruption scenario, some 80,000 could yet be displaced.

Despite their resilience, determination and courage, the people of southern Java have had enough.

June 4 blog