Quote:
Originally Posted by CookieCows
aww sorry to hear that. It is really sounding bad. What is the ash.. it's not like ground glass is it? I lived in Oregon when Mt. St. Helens went and I remember that was a huge deal because of it being glass and being told spray it off my car.. not rub it off etc...
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From Tungurahua the ash is basicly fine particulate basalt and obsidian with trace minerals, so yeah, it's pulverised volcanic glass and other abrasives. Everybody within the range of ashfall here wears protective masks, and the wisdom is not to drive until the ash stops falling, then sluice everything off. However, in areas where the ash really accumulates, like the N and SW flank towns, people shovel it off the sidewalk like North Americans do for snow.
It might sound bad, but it's in no way as severe as the 2008-2009 eruption, which eliminated most of the crops from the SW slope towns, and damaged those on the N slope. In 2008, we saw the price of mandarins go from $1 for about 50 to $1 for 12 - this was the volcano's fault. However, the 2009 crop was a bumper thanks to the renewal of the soils vis a vis the ash. This year the food problem will be worse, but not because of the volcano - because of the drought.