15 Dead in Congo Volcano

In the Eastern Republic of Congo at least 15 people are dead, after lava from a nearby Volcano poured into villages on Sunday, officials and survivors reported.

More than 500 homes were destroyed by the lava after the eruption of Mount Nyiragongo. This caused about 5000 persons to flee from Goma and found themselves in Rwanda, which is just across the border. Another 25000 went to Sake, which is to the north-west, sources revealed on Sunday.

After the volcano erupted on Saturday night more than 170 children were feared to be missing and Unicef officials were organizing transit to assist unaccompanied children there. Goma was largely spared the large scale destruction suffered there when the last eruption happened in 2002. Hundreds were left dead at the time and 100,000 were left without homes.

On Sunday, there was a lot of grief and uncertainty in the outlying villages not far from the volcano.

Authorities are still saying it is too soon to know how many died in the volcano. The air remained thick because many homes remains on fire due to the heavy flow of lava. The homeless people are hungry and afraid, as they don’t know where they will spend the night.

The scale of the loss in Goma is still hard to determine and residents said there was just a little warning before the eruption.

This city is a regional hub for many of the humanitarian agencies and the UN peacekeeping mission in that region.

Whole neighborhoods have been totally destroyed but the airport has been spared this time, in 2002 the lava flowed on the runways, this made the situation much worse. 

A large number of armed groups are vying for control of the mineral resources in the region, they are located in parts of the surrounding areas in eastern Congo which makes getting in and out of the area complicated.