11 hikers dead after Indonesia volcano erupts, dozen still missing

JAKARTA - Eleven hikers were found dead on Monday and another 12 were missing after a volcano erupted in Indonesia, with rescuers racing to carry injured and burned survivors down the mountain on foot.

Rescuers worked through the night to find dozens of hikers stranded on Mount Marapi on the island of Sumatra after it spewed an ash tower 3,000 metres  -- taller than the volcano itself -- into the sky on Sunday.

The dead hikers were found near Marapi's crater after the 2,891-metre volcano rained ash on nearby villages, according to a local rescue official.

Twelve were missing, three more were found alive and 49 had safely descended from the crater, some with burns and fractures, the official said.

The three other people who had been found alive were yet to be taken down the mountain, along with the 11 dead.

Local rescue agency spokesperson Jodi Haryawan said the rescue efforts had been broken up by sporadic eruptions but the search was still going despite the risks.

"Once it was safer they continued the search. So the search was not halted," he told AFP.

Rudy Rinaldi, head of the West Sumatra Disaster Mitigation Agency, told AFP some of the rescued hikers had suffered burns.

"Those who are injured were the ones who got closer to the crater," he said.

At least eight people suffered burns, one had burns and a fracture and another had a head wound, according to a list of those found from Basarnas, a national search and rescue agency, seen by AFP.

Ahmad Rifandi, an official at the Mount Marapi monitoring station, told AFP that ash rain was observed after the eruption and had reached Bukittinggi, the third-largest city in West Sumatra that has a population of more than 100,000.

The plume of smoke and ash blocked out the sun after the eruption and coated nearby cars, scooters and ambulances.

Marapi is on the second alert level of Indonesia's four-step system and authorities have imposed a three-kilometre exclusion zone around its crater.

The Indonesian archipelago sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, where the meeting of continental plates causes high volcanic and seismic activity.