Last Monday, National Geographic Channel, in their Savage Earth Week series, featured the Eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1991.
I can't say I vividly remember that time. I remember the ashfall, and the news about lahar, and evacuations. I even collected some ashfall from our car and it's probably in a small packet somewhere in the house (if it hasn't been thrown away yet).
Watching the feature, I realized how terrible that disaster really was, and how its effects were felt all over the world for years (temperatures dropped a few degrees for over two years because of the ash spewed in the atmosphere). Also how it created that lahar wasteland that is most of Pampanga.
It had that story of an Aeta village that sought refuge in the caves. Only one family survived, after they covered themselves with bat droppings (guano!) to escape the fiery heat. There were also stories of news correspondents escaping the avalanche of rock and mud, as they caught it all on film.
Anyway, the world didn't end then. But I don't think we've fully recovered 14 years after.
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2 comments:
I remember thinking it was weird that the sky was so dark at 3 in the afternoon. I couldn't believe that the ash being spewn from so far could reach all the way here. ah, the sometimes terrible wonders of nature.
I think I remember that one, the dark afternoons. The 1990 earthquake had more of an impact in Manila than the Mt. Pinatubo eruption.
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