Speaking activity 2 - Natural disaster

The tragedy of Armero was a natural disaster, product of the volcanic eruption of Nevado del Ruiz
volcano. Was on Wednesday, November 13th of 1985 and damaged the departments of Tolima
and Caldas in Colombia. After 69 years of inactivity, the eruption surprised all people, despite the
government in charge received days before some alerts about what was going on with the
volcano.

Armero, a town located just 50km from the volcano, was fully destroyed in where more than
20.000 of its 29.000 population died, almost all. There were victims in others towns, like Chinchiná
and Villamaría. Unfortunately, in September an earthquake took place in Mexico, the reason why
many rescuers personal was there giving some help.

Rescue efforts were hampered due to the mud that was everywhere. When rescuers arrived to
Armero, 12 hours after the eruption, most of people with several wounds, had died. The most
common case was Omayra Sanchez, a young lady who got trapped during 3 days before she died.
There is a famous photo that won the prize of World Press Photo of the Year.

People blame to the government about this disaster, because they feel that they could have done
more to save people, for example paying attention to all the alerts that organisms warned to the
president and evacuating and starting actions plan.