Efforts To Plug Indonesian Mud Volcano Resume

DISASTER MANAGEMENT

Indonesian officials drop concrete balls into a "mud volcano" in an attempt to slow its outflow of hot mud, in Sidoarjo, East Java, on 24 February. Engineers were again dropping chains of concrete balls into the main crater as they resumed a bid to stem the flow which has submerged entire villages. Photo courtesy AFP.

by Staff Writers
Jakarta (AFP) Feb 26, 2007
Engineers dropped chains of concrete balls into a "volcano" oozing hot mud in Indonesia's East Java province Monday as they resumed a bid to stem the flow which has submerged entire villages. "We have been able to insert four chains of concrete balls today, before changing smoke from the hot mud forced the operations to be halted," Rudi Novrianto, a spokesman for the audacious bid to plug the crater, told AFP.

The operation to drop the chains into the main crater was halted on Saturday when a cable linking two cranes hoisting them suffered damage.

Workers had managed to insert only the first chain. Each one links together four concrete balls.

Two cranes, one static and the other movable, have been erected on both sides of the crater. They are used to drop the chained concrete balls into the hole.

Work was delayed Sunday by repairs and heavy rains, which made conditions dangerous.

"We have had good weather today," Novrianto said. But he added the operation was called off for the remainder of Monday because drifting smoke from the hot mud had begun to affect workers.

"We will see tomorrow (Tuesday) whether the winds and the weather will allow us to continue the operations," Novrianto said.

Entire villages, factories and fields have been submerged by the mud, which has forced more than 15,000 people from their homes.

The mud sprang up when exploratory drilling by the PT Lapindo Brantas energy firm pierced an underground chamber of hydrogen sulphide, forcing hot mud to the surface in Sidoarjo, East Java.

Engineers plan to drop about 375 chains of concrete balls, weighing 400-500 kilograms (880-1,100 pounds), into the 50-metre (165-feet) mud hole, under a plan devised by a local expert.

The aim is to slow the mudflow by about 50-70 percent, but there is no guarantee the experimental attempt will work.

Source: Agence France-Presse

DISASTER MANAGEMENT Efforts To Plug Indonesian Mud Volcano Resume Sending Out An SOS Russian Satellites Come To The Rescue Japan Launches Alert System For Tsunamis And Missiles Bid To Plug Indonesian Mud Volcano Delayed	CLIMATE SCIENCE Banning New Coal Power Plants Will Slow Warming Satellite Data Vital To UN Climate Findings Russia, Kyoto Protocol And Climate Change Global Warming Is Real But Not A Priority
EARTH OBSERVATION GeoEye Makes Final Debt Payment For The Purchase Of Space Imaging Gascom To Launch 4 Smotr Low-Orbit Remote Sensing Satellites Canada And US Launch Satellite Mapping Project Of North America Brazilian Satellite Undergoes Environmental Tests	ENERGY TECH Tiny High-Frequency Cryocooler Is Cold And Efficient Its Lights Out For Edison In California Australia To Clip Greenhouse Gas Emmissions With Phase Out Of Inefficient Lighting No Cheers In Carbon Market As Kyoto Protocol Heads For Second Birthday
EPIDEMICS Resistant TB Spreads In Africa E. Coli Bacteria Migrating Between Humans And Chimps In Ugandan Park Bird Flu Spreading In Central Russia Deadly Rain And Flooding In Bolivia Trigger Disease Surge	FLORA AND FAUNA Warming Climate And Cod Collapse Have Combined To Cause Rapid North Atlantic Ecosystem Lizards Shout Against A Noisy Background To Get Points Across Chimpanzees Found To Use Tools To Hunt Mammalian Prey St Petersburg Court Rejects Schoolgirl Suit Over Darwinism
FROTH AND BUBBLE Carnegie Mellon Researchers Study Harmful Particulates UN Forum Makes Limited Progress On Mercury Emissions NASA Probes Sources Of The Tiniest Pollutants EasyJet Chief Says Business Travellers Have Role In Saving Environment	ABOUT US Immunologic Memory Discovery Reported Birth Rate And Competition Were Major Reasons For Past Hominid Extinctions Clovis People Maybe Not First To Populate North America Team Takes First Deep Dive Into Molecular Machinery Of Human Brain

The contents herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2005 - SpaceDaily. AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy statement