More than 47,000 people have fled their homes to seek refuge in crowded camps at a safe distance from the scalding ash and rocks, with experts warning the volcano could explode in a major eruption at any moment.

Mother-of-two Maritess Nina queued for food while her husband risked his life by returning to the danger zone to tend to the family's farmland.

"We had thin noodles and bread last night. We threw some corned beef into the mix," Nina told AFP.

"I only have 100 pesos (two dollars) in my pocket, and that's our fare for going home when it is safe to do so."

The government has sent the army in to evacuate farmers refusing to leave their homes in the area fearing high-speed avalanches of ash, rock and gas that incinerate everything in their path as they roll down the volcano's flanks.

Nina's husband, along with a few others, had slipped inside the security cordon to do farm work in their small plots in the hamlet of Bonga, some seven kilometres (4.5 miles) from the smouldering crater.

"He stayed behind in Bonga because he has to sow rice," Nina said. "He has two helpers with him."

Asked if the men feared the volcanic avalanches, which experts say are nine times hotter than boiling water and move at up to 240 kilometres an hour, Nina said the prevailing winds would work in their favour.

"It won't go that way, because the winds are blowing toward Guinobatan," she said, referring to a town south of Mayon.

Her children, aged 10 and 13, slept on the floor along with two dozen other people with cardboard cartons insulating them from the cold, but their mother said they were used to it.

But conditions at the Gogon Central School, home to nearly 4,000 evacuees, were for many an improvement.

"The bathrooms here are a lot better than the one we have at home," Nina said. "The governor had them built especially for us."

A third of families in the province where Mayon is located are officially considered poor, including many of the farmers displaced by the eruption.

Nina said the evacuees were surviving on basic government rations, with men raising whatever they could from their farms to supplement food handouts.

"We're getting rice and assorted items: sardines, noodles, coffee," she said.

The government said in its latest bulletin that a hazardous eruption was possible within days, in an escalation from its relatively controlled eruption so far.

Some 96 ash explosions, reaching heights of up to two kilometres, booming sounds and 871 volcanic quakes had been recorded in the past 24 hours.

The 2,460-metre (8,070-foot) volcano, famed for its near-perfect cone, has erupted 48 times in recorded history. In 1814, more than 1,200 people were killed as lava buried the town of Cagsawa.

earlier related report
White Christmas, of sorts, for Philippine volcano evacuees
Legaspi, Philippines (AFP) Dec 24, 2009 - People displaced by an erupting volcano prepared for a "White Christmas" of a different kind on Thursday as Mayon spewed ash and politicians bearing gifts trooped to evacuation centres.

Rain ceased on Christmas Eve for the first time in five days as tens of thousands forced to flee by the restive volcano weighed up whether they could return home to celebrate with the traditional midnight meal.

However authorities were warning them to stay put and not venture within eight kilometres (five miles) of the crater because of the hazards posed by scalding ash and red-hot lava flowing down its flanks.

The army said a platoon of infantry and three military trucks went around the no-go areas Thursday to round up people refusing to keep out.

"The orders have been executed," local military spokesman Captain Razaleigh Bansawan told reporters, but would not say if anyone was arrested.

"I advise the evacuees to stay at the evacuation centres for their own safety, rather than going home for Christmas," Albay provincial governor Joey Salceda said.

Monsignor Lucilo Quiambao of the Saint Raphael parish said the displaced should not feel too sorry as they find themselves sleeping on the floor in abject evacuation camps, some of which are short of basic necessities like toilets.

"Jesus Christ was not in his own place in Nazareth when he was born during a cold winter night," Quiambao told his congregation, likening their lot to conditions during the Nativity.

"You are sort of imitating him at this time," he said. "This will be a sort of consolation for you."

Mayon, one of the country's most active volcanoes, began a relatively quiet eruption on Sunday, spewing ash and lava amid ominous rumbling sounds and hundreds of volcanic earthquakes a day.

More than 47,000 people, many from farms on its lower slopes, left their homes amid fears of possible "hazardous explosive eruptions" which a government advisory Thursday said could happen "within days".

The 2,460-metre (8,070-foot) volcano, famed for its near-perfect cone, has erupted 48 times in recorded history. In 1814, more than 1,200 people were killed as lava buried the town of Cagsawa.

Ash was seen shooting from the crater early Thursday, and was carried by winds to communities southeast of the cone.

"Based on previous eruptions, there would be a progressive escalation," said chief government volcanologist Renato Solidum.

"From a lava flow, it graduates into throwing up ash and rocks. After that there could be stronger explosions with boulders and ash, or pyroclastic flows, shooting up several kilometres (miles) high," Solidum added.

Under clear skies people near the volcano were treated to the spectacular sight of glowing lava and fountains of searing rock shooting up from the crater early Thursday as they attended the last of the pre-dawn masses celebrated across the Roman Catholic nation in the 10 days before Christmas Day.

At Legaspi airport, planes continued to fly in hundreds of holidaymakers, many of them relatives returning for family reunions.

Some posed for pictures as they left the plane, using the erupting volcano as a dramatic backdrop.

Forty-year-old housewife Vilma Mirandilla's immediate problem was finding decent food at a local high school where they had sought refuge, along with more than 1,000 other people. The school has only 16 functioning toilets.

"On our first day here we were given two kilograms (4.4 pounds) of rice, a can of sardines and a pack of noodles," she told AFP.

"On the third day we got just two kilograms of rice and five kilograms of rice on the fourth day," she added.

But prospects appeared to brighten Thursday as at least three candidates for the May 2010 presidential election drove into the evacuation centres aboard trucks laden with food.

At the Gogon Central School, which has been turned into a temporary home for 3,400 evacuees, a long queue formed at the back of a truck festooned with an orange banner welcoming Senator Manny Villar.

Former president Joseph Estrada, who is seeking a fresh six-year term, handed out relief goods around Mayon on Wednesday while Senator Richard Gordon, another presidential candidate, arrived Thursday.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) sent truckloads of biscuits Thursday to cheer up the evacuees.

"WFP has sent a total of 20 tonnes of high energy biscuits to assist the evacuees during this difficult moment," it said in a statement.

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