Approved For Release 2000/08/08
: CIA-RDP96-00789R001^00|W01-8
-HWWSWNOFORN
- HANDLE VIA SKEET CHANNELS ONLY
PROJECT SUN STREAK
(U)
WARNING NOTICE:
INTELLIGENCE SOURCES AND METHODS
INVOLVED
PROJECT
NUMBER:
0126
DATE OF SESSION:
7 JUN
START:
1434
METHODOLOGY:
CRV
SESSION NUMBER:
DATE OF REPORT:
JUN
END:
1507
VIEWER
IDENTIFIER:
025
1.
(S/NF/SK)
MISSION:
Stags
training.
Site
was
the
town
of
Armero
t
Columbia
on
the day of
a natural
disaster
(town washed away by
mud slide).
Monitor
intent
was
for
the
viewer
to experience and
describe percepts associated with moving
mud.
2.
(S/NF/SK)
VIEWER TASKING:
Coordinates 0126/1185.
3.
(S/NF/SK)
COMMENTS:
Excellent session from beginning to
end.
025
experienced the
first strong Aesthetic
Impact
(AI)
.
4.
(S/NF/SK)
EVALUATION:
Wt 3
SGI J
CPT
,
USA
'NOFORN
SKEET CHANNELS ONLY
CLASSIFIED
BY:
DIA-DT
DECLASSIFY
:
OADR
Approved For Release 2000/08/08
: CIA-RDP96-00789R001 50061 0001 -8
IUIUUU
ULl
UUltl
IU
LUC
lUlgCvH
lUlftUUL
111UU UHUL.J
ill LJUUU1
i UliCl 1
first
signs
of an impending major
eruption. The U.S. Geological Sur-
vey said yesterday that Nevado del
Ruiz
suffered
“two
catastrophic
eruptions"
Wednesday,
night
be-
tween 11 p.m. and midnight.
The
back-to-back
eruptions
on
the northeast flarik of the mountain
melted enough ice and snow on the
mountaintop
to
trigger
what
the
USGS called “two catastrophic mud
flows down
the
northeast
flank,"
which were channeled directly into
the
Lagunillas River
in
the broad
valley at the base of the mountain.
Eyewitnesses said the mud
in four
esc
oi
six volcanoes strung
iuan msiory.
out in a line through central
:
Appr<^e^tfeirfew^s
an®ri
the Andes Mountains, Nevado
del
Ruiz
has
also
been
the most
de-
structive of the six Colombian
vol-
canoes, erupting
in a “thunderous"
explosion on March
12, 1595, and
erupting again
in
1828 and
1829.
The volcano was
“still smoking"
in
1831
after
its
two>
19th-century
eruptions.
The
Colombian
mountain
was
also
the
scene
of
a
major
earth-
quake on Feb, 19, 1845, that shook
loose enough snow and ice on top of
the mountain to trigger one of the
arrei
"wall of
aui
saiu.
mis means u&j
iUuUl
eir
gases,
allowing
pressure
to
MifkJ&fek tteua.
them in a
SB5 ii*
down
the
valley
to
the
Rio Mag-
dalena,
killing an estimated 1,000
people" then living in the valley.
Why did Nevado del Ruiz go al-
most 400
years
without
a
major
eruption? Geologists say they don’t
know, but many suspect it is in the
makeup of the magma that lies be-
low the volcanoes that formed the
Andes Mountains.
“The magmas
in
the Andes are
very viscous and s' ickier, let’s say,
than the magmas that
lie beneath
the Hawaiian volcanoes," Christian-
w wayTnaPTTOmaTeiKTCTne pressure
that builds up inside volcanoes, he
said.
“Hawaiian
volcanoes
are
al-
ways
blowing
off pressure, which
might
be
one
reason
they
don’t
erupt catastrophically.”
Another reason
lies with
volca-
. noes themselves, among the most
unpredictable phenomena of nature.
Said Dr. Meyer Rubin of the USGS:
“Volcanoes
can
go
1,000
years
without
an
eruption.
There’s
no
way to predict their behavior.”
The upward movement of magma
can continue off and on for years,
e weignt of the rocks above
are holding
it
in. The result ca
another eruption. The twin eru;
of
Nevado
del
Ruiz
Wedne
night could thus signal the stai
an eruptive period
that ‘couic
another 10 years.
There
is
also
the
chance
Nevado del Ruiz will have -an im
on the world’s weather. Depen
on how much sulfur dioxjde
g;
pumps into the upper atmosph
the erupting volcano could
sei
cloud
of gas and dust around
world blocking just enough sun!
from reaching
the
surface -‘to
the earth by a degree or two.
fcSJSil
miles
r#
-
--
Magdalena
*
A
River
"
* ^
llilli
did t
*. / ^Z^MCauca
" ^
"
TKManizales^^J-
^f/Cartago 1
fPereifaj^g^yi
-
.
,
WS^QCyL—
y ^•>^‘-:«r^^bague v
:
•
.il
!
• Sea
v/
-PANAMA
L3.--:v\
•VENEZUELA
,
Bogota
'*
O
-
COLOMBIA
'*
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Mud surrounds and partially buries Armero, as seen from a nearby hilL The town center is inundated at lower right.
Mg'S ;•
/"y
s
y x-vxc
:
..
;
v v. • VV :• > A
•
.•. V J
• x :
**
'
'
‘
j
‘ s
-
:v
'
''••-4
•
1 £ '
ECUADOR
BY LARRY FOGa—THE WASHINGTON POST
^>/
I
PERU
4 BRAZIL
789R001 50061 0001 -8
^xQPYRGHT
im
I
^
UNITED PRESS INTERNATtOHMyREUTER
ombian rescue workers assist a woman washed away from the town of Armero by the muddy flood waters.
church—a 5- or 6-story build-
•was almost completely buried.
heverry made
it to safety, he
ined, by
building a bridge
to
ground with bits of wood, pick-
s Way past pieces of pots, teie-
i sets, homes and bodies.
'
aking calmly but bitterly, the
al
administrator
criticized
nment authorities for hesitat-
?fore declaring an emergency,
ite reports of volcanic activity
>.m. yesterday, he said, nation-
lio stations were
still advising
after a
natural dam
of rocks and -
stone above the town broke under
the force of onrushing waters.
The
destructive mud flows had
been
predicted
in
a
report
presented only yesterday by Colom-
bian geologists. The report was or-
dered
several
months
ago
after
Nevado_del .Ruiz .started showing
early signs of reawakening.
It was
the scene of an earthquake in 1845
that set off floods and killed about
l.ooo, ^firrgH§4iI«9£iR§1-e
quin Acosta,
The last time lava flowed was in
But
less
accurately—as
last
night's events proved—the report
also predicted that the flow of mud
would be slow and easily permit the
evacuation
of surrounding
popula-
tions.
Citing Armero
specifically,
the study—as summarized
in
to-
day’s editions of the Colombian dai-
ly El Tiempo^said the town could
be cleared within two hours without
danger.
tral air
traffic corridor and
its
( ex-
plosion last night was witnessed by
Some wept. Others, dressed only in tfig]
underwear or bedclothes they had oiiwhen
the disaster struck, shivered in shock in
the warm air here*
CPYRGHT
CPYRGHT-
ARMERO, From Al
her and her family as they climbed
to the second story to pray for their
lives.
Sandra
Patricia
Perez,
13,
her
face badly scratched and her head
wrapped in a white cloth, said she
nearly choked beneath the mud but'
somehow
remained
conscious
as
she tumbled away from Armero in
the flood.
.
Hortensia Oliveros, 19 years old
and eight months pregnant, saw the
rushing
water
sweep
their
11-
month-old
child
out
of
her
hus-
band's arms. In the panic, she heard
heard of him. She ended up near a
iv«Ti rtVrfiiurimkii
in Armero instructed him 'to take
cover in the stadium. There
, he saw
perhaps
3,000
people
pressing
against the entrance when the tor-
rent of hot mud came over them.
He,
too, was immersed; in
the
flood,
he
said,
which
scalded
his
body. Holding to a tree branch, he
drifted
six
miles
to
the. town
of
Guayaval, where at 5:30 this morn-
ing
he was
rescued.
“I. was
just
about to give up,” he said. His wife,
eight
months
pregnant,
- has
not
been found.
In
this
town,
about
six. miles
north
of
Amero,
flood
waters
knocked out a bridge spanning the
Guali River and demolished
to
20 waterside homes, said residents.
Some people decided
to evacuate,
but hundreds of curious onlookers