Indonesia to shift 3,000 families away from mud flow on Java

Indonesia will resettle more than 3,000 families whose houses have been swamped by mud surging from a gas exploration site and will dump the sludge into the sea to avoid more destruction, a minister said Wednesday.

The mud appeared after an accident occurred deep in a drilling shaft on the seismically charged island of Java. It now covers more than 270 hectares and is currently being contained by an ever-expanding network of dams that are breached almost daily.