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CNN Live Saturday

Volcanic Eruption Devastates Congo Village

Aired January 19, 2002 - 17:21   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JEANNE MESERVE, CNN ANCHOR: In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a volcanic eruption pours ash and lava over surrounding villages and towns. The city of Goma was hit hard.

And as CNN's Catherine Bond reports, residents there have begun the long process of recovery.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CATHERINE BOND, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A charred and blackened wasteland, what remains of the Congolese town of Goma after a volcanic eruption sent rivers of molten lava flowing down its streets. A smoky haze means from here you can't even see the volcano that caused it. The lava burying everything in its path: trucks, sidewalks, shops and homes.

"My house no longer exists," Jean (ph) tells us. "I've no clothes. My family is completely scattered."

Blocking out volcanic dust, many Congolese have come back to take a look. The lava underneath the crust, still red-hot.

(on camera): From here you can really feel the heat of the lava, and you can also feel the effect of the fumes; and you can hear in the background the chaos that this volcanic eruption has caused in the town of Goma as people come out on the streets to loot.

(voice-over): Some of the looters, children breaking shop windows to steal nothing more than second-hand clothes. Not much more is left on Goma's main street.

This used to be another ordinary street. Now in place of houses here, a chimney -- the houses buried, the roofs just twisted metal, the heat leaving trees in cinders.

GEORGE RUBAGUMYA, BUSINESSMAN: I was telling people that I left a real nice town, and I've come back to a ghost town. It's impossible to believe. Nature can be very cruel.

BOND: Amid the devastation, one man tidying up. But it's going to take more than tidying to remove the mounds of rock, some still bursting into flames, both in the town and at Goma's international airport. Vital to commercial and relief flights, the hub of the United Nations peace-monitoring mission in the Eastern Congo, the runway a wall of fire, with miles of lava alongside it, engulfing shacks.

Though number of deaths here is still unclear. What is known is that many got out in time, salvaging a few possessions, pouring across the border into Rwanda where there's nothing for them.

"From the time we left Goma," Alexei (ph) tells us, "we haven't had anything to eat."

They say they don't want to go into refugee camps here. Their solution, to send their families back into the Congo. This old rusting boat heading across lake Kivu for another Congolese city where they hope friends and relatives will take them in.

Catherine Bond, CNN, Gisenyi, Rwanda.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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