By Ingrid "Shortwave" Frost
Anak Krakatau started erupting late Friday night, and by Sunday the disruption had a number attached: roughly 270,000 people stranded, according to the BBC, as airports in the region kept extending their closures.
The volcano sits about 150 kilometers from Jakarta, Indonesia's capital, close enough that ash and disruption ripple quickly into the country's busiest air corridors. Airlines and airport authorities have been forced into a familiar calculus with volcanic ash: engines and visibility don't mix, so flights get grounded until plumes clear and skies are confirmed safe — a process that can drag on for days.
Anak Krakatau — the name means "Child of Krakatoa" — grew from the underwater caldera left by the catastrophic 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, one of the deadliest volcanic events in recorded history. It has a history of sudden, violent activity, including a 2018 eruption and collapse that triggered a tsunami killing hundreds of people along the Sunda Strait coastline.
The BBC's reporting available here does not specify casualty figures from this eruption or a timeline for reopening, and those details should be confirmed as they emerge. What's clear for now is the scale of the disruption: a quarter-million people unable to fly, airports extending closures with no firm end date, and a mountain with a violent history reminding a region what it sits next to.
— Compiled from reporting by BBC World.
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