Tourists are evacuated in Chile as volcano erupts

Llaima, which lies in Chile's picturesque lake region about 435 miles (700 km) south of the capital Santiago, erupted on January 1, 2008 and has spewed pyroclastic rock and ash sporadically since.

"We have evacuated 10 people from the area as a precautionary measure," an official at the early warning office of the country's National Emergency Office said, asking not to be named. "That includes local residents and tourists."

Ash from the volcano had swollen a nearby river, sweeping a pedestrian bridge away with it, but there had been no other damage, she said, adding that experts had not been able to fly over the area on Saturday because of overcast conditions.

Bright red bursts of lava were visible in the sky overnight as the volcano erupted, she said.

On its website ONEMI said there were "permanent explosions that reach 600 metres above the crater. Falling ash is visible and ... a flow of lava of more than 1,000 metres has been observed".

Local media reported the lava flow had increased to 3 km in length, but the ONEMI official said it was impossible to tell.

Chile's chain of some 2,000 volcanoes is the world's second-largest after Indonesia. Around 50 to 60 are recorded to have erupted, while 500 are deemed potentially active.

The 10,253-foot (3,127-metre) Llaima was the second to erupt in the past year.

The Chaiten volcano, 760 miles (1,222 km) south of Santiago in the Patagonia region, erupted last May for the first time in thousands of years, spewing ash, gas and molten rock and prompting the evacuation of thousands of people.

Ash from Chaiten soared 20 miles into the atmosphere, swelled rivers and caused floods that damaged dozens of houses and destroyed much of the nearby town of the same name.

Chaiten erupted again in February, prompting a fresh evacuation of residents who had rejected a government plan to abandon the town and rebuild it a few miles away.

(Writing by Simon Gardner; Editing by Paul Simao)