The powerful eruption of the La Soufriere volcano on the Caribbean island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, took place on Friday, April 9, sending clouds of ash into the air blanketing the island. These clouds are now spreading to the neighboring islands of Barbados and St. Lucia.
The thick cloud has hampered relief efforts on the islands by grounding air travel. A further complication is that this disaster is taking place during the COVID-19 pandemic, with cruise ships that have come to get people off the island making escape possible only for those who have been vaccinated.
This Business Insider report from Marianne Guenot has the details.
People on the Caribbean island where a volcano went off are being evacuated on cruise ships—but not without a COVID-19 vaccine
People on the volcano-stricken island of St. Vincent will be evacuated to certain neighboring islands only if they've been vaccinated against COVID-19, the nation's prime minister said.
Cruise ships have been dispatched to the island that is being partially evacuated after the 4,000-foot high volcano La Soufrière erupted on Friday.
But people have to be vaccinated before they board the cruise ship, Ralph Gonsalves, the prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, said at a press conference the day after the eruption.
Jacqueline Charles, who covers the Caribbean for The Miami Herald, reported other major concerns.
Volcano eruption in St. Vincent brings new worries: Destruction of parts of the country
The eastern Caribbean island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which saw the eruption of its La Soufrière volcano for the first time in 42 years, woke up Sunday to heavy ash fall everywhere, more explosive eruptions, minor earthquakes overnight and a new worry: the possible destruction of communities from heavy flows of lava droplets and hot gas.
Lead geologist Richard Robertson said while white-colored volcanic ash covered everything from rooftops and roads to the island’s vegetation, scientists with the University of the West Indies Seismic Research Center were becoming increasingly concerned about the destruction of communities near the volcano.
A video obtained by the team, he said, showed evidence of pyroclastic flows — the fast-moving volcanic ash, lava droplets and hot gas that can incinerate everything in its path, instantly.
“They will tend to boil the sea and they will shoot across the sea as a foam of rapidly moving hot air,” Robertson said. “We don’t have lava flows, the nice flow, running things, that’s red... What we have is fragments of rocks, and boulders and other things that shoot down the mountainside very fast and destroy everything.”
We are also seeing reports from neighboring islands.
News agencies from around the world have posted stories, though it has bothered me that this was not a top story in my daily U.S. news feeds.
The La Soufriere volcano on the Caribbean island of St Vincent and the Grenadines has had a new “explosive event”. The volcano erupted on Friday, shaking the ground and blanketing the island in a layer of fine volcanic rock after decades of inactivity, prompting an evacuation of residents nearby. On Saturday, eruptions and rumbling emanating from La Soufriere continued as Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves ordered the evacuation of residents close to the activity. The country’s National Emergency Management Organization (NEMO) noted “another explosive event” early on Sunday morning with the “majority of the country out of power and covered in ash”.
You can follow the University of the West Indies Seismic Research Center for ongoing reports.
On the day of the first explosion, Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves held a press conference and was visibly moved to tears by the outpouring of aid coming from other parts of the Caribbean community.
Though this may not be the top story in U.S. news feeds, it is the major story in the Caribbean community. The Caribbean diaspora is global and includes the United States, where approximately 4.4 million Caribbean immigrants reside. Caribbean communities in the U.S. and Canada are now stepping up to send much-needed aid to St. Vincent.
Here are some places you can connect with to give support.
No surprise that José Andrés’ World Central Kitchen is already on St. Vincent.
Please spread the word and do what you can to help.