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Indonesia's Mount Ibu Erupts More than 1,000 Times this Month

Mount Ibu, on the Indonesian island of Halmahera, has erupted more than a thousand times this month. AZZAM / AFP/File
Mount Ibu, on the Indonesian island of Halmahera, has erupted more than a thousand times this month. AZZAM / AFP/File
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Indonesia's Mount Ibu Erupts More than 1,000 Times this Month

Mount Ibu, on the Indonesian island of Halmahera, has erupted more than a thousand times this month. AZZAM / AFP/File
Mount Ibu, on the Indonesian island of Halmahera, has erupted more than a thousand times this month. AZZAM / AFP/File

A volcano in eastern Indonesia has erupted at least a thousand times this month, according to an official report Sunday as efforts were underway to evacuate thousands of villagers living near the rumbling mountain.

Mount Ibu, on the remote island of Halmahera in North Maluku province, sent a column of smoke up to four kilometers (2.5 miles) into the sky in an eruption on Wednesday, AFP said.

Indonesian officials raised its alert status to the highest level and called for the evacuation of 3,000 people living in six nearby villages.

It was one of 1,079 eruptions by the volcano recorded since January 1 by Indonesia's Geological Agency, sending columns of ash reaching between 0.3 and 4 kilometers above its peak, according to the agency's data gathered by AFP.

The latest big eruption occurred on Sunday at 1:15 am local time as it spewed a towering cloud of ash 1.5 kilometers into the air.

"The ash was grey, with moderate to thick intensity, drifting southwest. A loud rumbling sound was heard all the way to Mount Ibu Observation Post," the agency said in a statement.

It added that the volcano had erupted 17 times on Sunday alone.

Despite deciding to evacuate affected villagers, local authorities had only managed to evacuate 517 residents as of Sunday, pledging to persuade those who remained to stay in safe shelters.

Many have refused to evacuate, arguing that they were used to the situation and were in harvest season.

"There might be economic considerations, as many residents are in the middle of harvesting crops. However, we will continue to educate the community and encourage them to evacuate," said Adietya Yuni Nurtono, Ternate district military commander in charge of a safe shelter.

Mount Ibu, one of Indonesia's most active volcanos, has shown a significant increase in activity since last June.

Residents living near Mount Ibu and tourists have been advised to avoid a five- to six-kilometer exclusion zone around the volcano's peak and to wear face masks in case of falling ash.

As of 2022, around 700,000 people were living on Halmahera island, according to official data.

Indonesia, a vast archipelago, experiences frequent seismic and volcanic activity as it lies along the Pacific Ring of Fire.

Last November, Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki, a 1,703-meter (5,587-foot) twin-peaked volcano on the tourist island of Flores erupted more than a dozen times in one week, killing nine people in its initial explosion.

Mount Ruang in North Sulawesi province erupted more than half a dozen times last year, forcing thousands from nearby islands to evacuate.

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Wuhan Keen to Shake off Pandemic Label Five Years On

A man wearing a face mask looks over a barricade set up to keep people out of a residential compound in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on April 14, 2020. (AFP)
A man wearing a face mask looks over a barricade set up to keep people out of a residential compound in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on April 14, 2020. (AFP)
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Wuhan Keen to Shake off Pandemic Label Five Years On

A man wearing a face mask looks over a barricade set up to keep people out of a residential compound in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on April 14, 2020. (AFP)
A man wearing a face mask looks over a barricade set up to keep people out of a residential compound in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on April 14, 2020. (AFP)

Built in just days as Covid-19 cases spiked in Wuhan in early 2020, the Huoshenshan Hospital was once celebrated as a symbol of the Chinese city's fight against the virus that first emerged there.

The hospital now stands empty, hidden behind more recently built walls -- faded like most traces of the pandemic as locals move on and officials discourage discussion of it.

On January 23, 2020, with the then-unknown virus spreading, Wuhan sealed itself off for 76 days, ushering in China's zero-Covid era of strict travel and health controls and foreshadowing the global disruption yet to come.

Today, the city's bustling shopping districts and gridlocked traffic are a far cry from the empty streets and crammed emergency rooms that marked the world's first Covid lockdown.

"People are moving forward, these memories are getting fuzzier and fuzzier," Jack He, a 20-year-old university student and Wuhan local, told AFP.

He was in high school when the lockdown was imposed, and he spent much of his sophomore year taking online classes from home.

"We still feel like those few years were especially tough... but a new life has started," He said.

- Official silence -

At the former site of the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where scientists believe the virus may have crossed over from animals to humans, a light blue wall has been built to shield the market's closed-down stalls from view.

When AFP visited, workers were putting up Chinese New Year decorations on the windows of the market's second floor, where a warren of opticians' shops still operates.

There is nothing to mark the location's significance -- in fact, there are no major memorials to the lives lost to the virus anywhere in the city.

Official commemorations of Wuhan's lockdown ordeal focus on the heroism of doctors and the efficiency with which the city responded to the outbreak, despite international criticism of the local government's censorship of early cases in December 2019.

The market's old produce stalls have been moved to a new development outside the city center, where it was clear that the city was still on edge about its reputation as the cradle of the pandemic.

Over a dozen vendors at the aptly named New Huanan Seafood Market refused to speak about the market's past.

The owner of one stall told AFP on condition of anonymity that "business here is not what it was before".

Another worker said the market's managers had sent security camera footage of AFP journalists out to a mass WeChat group of stall owners and warned them against speaking to the reporters.

- 'City of heroes'-

One of the few remaining public commemorations of the lockdown is next door to the abandoned Huoshenshan hospital -- an unassuming petrol station that doubles as an "anti-Covid-19 pandemic educational base".

One wall of the station was dedicated to a timeline of the lockdown, complete with photographs of President Xi Jinping visiting Wuhan in March 2020.

An employee told AFP that a small building behind the facility's convenience store housed another exhibit, but it was only open "when leaders come to visit".

But days before the fifth anniversary of the lockdown, those memories seemed far away, the city now a hive of activity.

Locals thronged the Shanhaiguan Road breakfast market, munching on bowls of noodles and deep-fried pastries.

In the upmarket Chuhe Hanjie shopping street, people walked dogs and promenaded in designer outfits while others queued to pick up bubble tea orders.

Chen Ziyi, a 40-year-old Wuhan local, said she believed the city's increased prominence has actually had a positive impact, with more tourists visiting.

"Now everyone pays more attention to Wuhan," she said. "They say Wuhan is the city of heroes."