RESIDENTS of the Chilean town of Chaitén returned to their homes this week, only to discover the remnants of their lives covered under a grey carpet of soot and ash.
The 3,550ft Chaitén volcano erupted in early May, after a period of dormancy lasting around 9,000 years.
The ferocity of the eruption prompted a mass evacuation of the nearby town, located in the remote Los Lagos region, 750 miles south of the c
apital, Santiago.
Fifty residents of the town, which once had a population of some 4,500, were taken back by the Chilean government in attempt to recover some of their possessions.
But as these photographs show, little was left undamaged by the devastating power of the eruption, which at its height was throwing a 19-mile column of ash into the sky, forcing aircraft to divert and affecting weather in large parts of the South American continent.
The ash from the volcano, which started erupting on 2 May, is made up of pulverised rock containing all kinds of minerals.
It has spoiled lakes, rivers and lagoons, coated plants in a dense layer of grey and altered the sensitive habitat of animals now struggling to survive. Satellite images showed a white stripe smeared across the southern part of South America during the eruption.
Severe flooding has also hit the area around Chaitén as the fall-out from the volcano swelled rivers and caused them to breach their banks. One of the biggest problems is that the ash mixed with water has turned concrete-like upon drying.
Though it is too early to say what the long-term effects will be, ecologists say life has permanently changed in the region's pine and cypress forests, inhabited by pumas and huemules, a rare species of deer.
Experts have insisted the ash is not toxic, though people in the Argentine provinces of Chubut and Rio Negro and those in Chile's Tenth Region complained of burning eyes, breathing trouble and tainted water as it fell on them.
Scientists from the US Geological Service are planning to install an early warning system on the volcano.
"There was virtually no instrumental monitoring at Chaitén volcano prior to the eruption," one USGS scientist, John Ewert, said.
"Without the monitoring, people nearby or at risk have almost no time to prepare themselves, their families or their possessions for what may be a life-altering event."
"The Chaitén volcano is continuing to build a lava dome at a spectacular rate, to emit fine ash, and to produce lahars – rivers of mud and debris – that continue to flow through the town," said another Geological Service scientist, Andy Lockhart, who was at Chaitén.
The volcano could continue to erupt on a smaller scale for several years, experts say.
Residents of the town are understood to be keen to return to their former lives, and to this end, the Chilean government is planning to relocate Chaitén in its entirety.
"Life in Chaitén will never be the same, but those affected must remain assured that their assets will be restored to them," said Edmundo Perez, the interior minister.
In one of the more unusual aspects of the disaster, 600,000 salmon were also evacuated from fish farms around Chaitén – and the government sent in soldiers to rescue pets which had been left behind.
The full article contains 567 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
