Volcano on Alaskan Island Erupts

On Saturday, ten people were rescued off the Aleutian Islands of Alska after an unexpected volcanic eruption. They were taken to Ductch Harbor 65 miles away were they stayed in a hotel. Fortunately, there were no reported injuries or deathes. Lonnie Kennedy lives on the foot of the 3,500 foot volcano with his family. "We heard something that sounded like thunder and went outside and right away realized it wasn't thunder. It sounded like huge rocks rolling or something," he said. "I told everyone it sounds like the volcano is blowing up and we need a plan to get out of here." Kennedy used a helicopter to fly  his famiyl 6 miles away to Unalaska Island to get away from the worst of the ash. Kennedy also said that the ash was so intense that you couldn't say anything. The fishing ship the Tara Gaila finally brought them to the hotel around 3am. The result of the explosion was a large ash plume in the sky.

"The volcano erupted at 11:43 a.m. and reached peak activity about two hours later, said Cyrus Read, a geophysicist with the Alaska Volcano Observatory, which has several seismic stations on the Okmok Caldera. The Okmok Caldera contains more than a dozen volcanic cones. Scientists weren't sure which cone exploded Saturday."

The ash cloud was estimated at 45,000 feet today, and the cloud was expected to continue drifting south.  Naturally this would pose risk to an aircraft.