Thousands of people in St. Vincent and the Grenadines have fled their homes as the La Soufrière volcano, located in the northwest of the island of St. Vincent, continues to erupt this week. The volcano, which had been dormant since 1979, shot up a column of ash 20,000 feet into the air on Friday, following months of rumblings that experts say foretold a big explosion.
La Soufrière let out a massive explosion on April 12 that created a dense and fast flow of lava and ash down the side of the volcano. “It’s destroying everything in its path,” Erouscilla Joseph, director of the University of the West Indies’ Seismic Research Center, told the AP. “Anybody who would have not heeded the evacuation, they need to get out immediately.”