L

ahar from the summit area of Mount Sinabung has destroyed hectares of farmland in Sukatendel village, Payung district, Karo regency, North Sumatra.

'€œThe lahar carry rocks and logs, destroying people'€™s fields and residential compounds,'€ village head Rahmat Perangin-angin said on Monday, adding there were no fatalities in the incident.

Rahmat said the volcanic material had been flowing since Sunday afternoon and continued flowing as of Monday in huge volumes.

He said the lahar had destroyed some 20 hectares of the farmland, causing local farmers to suffer from huge financial losses as the fields, were ready to be harvested.

Rahmat also said that villagers were afraid of more lahar especially because rainfall over the Karo regency for the past few days had been extremely high.

He further said that people in his region had made dams around their respective houses to prevent them from being hit by the lahar.

Separately, Karo Regency Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD) head Matius Sembiring said his office had deployed staff to help people affected by the lahar.

Three weeks earlier, a farmer of Susuk village, Tiganderket district, was killed after being swept away by lahar when he was on the way home from his farmland.

The farmer, identified as Abdi Surbakti, 45, was dragged as far as 1.5 kilometers by the lahar flow.

After showing relatively low volcanic activity over the past weeks, Mount Sinabung erupted again last month, triggering pyroclastic flows and spewing volcanic ash that enveloped surrounding areas.

Mt. Sinabung, standing at 2,460 meters, was inactive for centuries before erupting in August 2010. Three years later, it erupted again and has never entirely stopped since then, forcing residents living near the volcano to be constantly prepared for evacuation should volcanic activity escalate suddenly.

The eruptions have also claimed more than a dozen lives and destroyed thousands of houses and hectares of farmland. The Mt. Sinabung area is well-known as center of vegetable and orange fruit production, supplying other regions in the province.

The tourist industry in Berastagi, Karo regency was reportedly much affected by the eruptions as visitors started to stay away from the resort town. But some foreign tourists reportedly still visit the area, some to even watch the eruptions.