Head of Jrakah village, Tumar, said the roads were covered with landslides so that road traffic became totally disrupted following the volcano`s lava floods.
"The landslides occurred on Sunday at 05.50 PM local time. Since then, locals are afraid of going out of Sepi hamlet," he said.
The lava floods hit various areas near Mount Merapi`s slopes amid the rains that kept falling from Sunday afternoon till evening at 11.00 PM local time, he said.
Despite the serious landslides and lava floods, there were no reports of fatalities so far, Tumar said.
"We cannot yet check the real condition on the ground due to the rain. The information that we have so far was about certain parts of water pipes in Jarak Kidul hamlet that have been destroyed by the lava floods," he said.
According to a rescue worker from Jalin Merapi, Sinam Sutarno, the lava floods broke out on Saturday caused two bridges to collapse in Klakah village.
The bridges linked the areas of Wonolelo village, Sawangan subdistsrict, Magelang district, to Klakah village in Boyolali district, he said.
Last December, Mount Merapi`s cold lava floods also paralyzed access roads to Tlogolele village, Selo subdistrict, Boyolali district.
Mount Merapi had erupted repeatedly in the past two or three weeks but its most fatal eruptions occurred on October 26 and November 5.
As a result of the eruptions, at least 259 people had perished and many others sustained serious burns and became displaced.
Mount Merapi, on the border between two provinces, lies geographically close to Yogyakarta but is officially part of Central Java.
The volcano`s eruptions spewed hot clouds of ash and lava into the air and sent lava down its many slopes.
Besides killing and injuring several hundred people, eruptions had also damaged 867 hectares of forested land on the volcano`s slopes in Sleman District, Yogyakarta, with material losses estimated at Rp33 billion.
The damaged forested areas included the Merapi National Park, community forests and local people`s plantations.
Mount Merapi is one of the most active volcanoes in Indonesia, whose eruptions have regularly been detected since 1548. (*)
Editor: Kunto Wibisono
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
