More than 5,000 people have fled their homes in Indonesia's North Sumatra province after a series of volcanic eruptions, a disaster management official said Friday. The Mount Sinabung volcano in Karo district has erupted intermittently since September, prompting authorities to raise the alert status to the second-highest level, dpa reported. On Thursday it spewed hot ash 7,000 metres into the sky, said Sutopo Nugroho, a spokesman for the National Disaster Management Agency. There have been no fatalities so far, he said. Mount Sinabung had been dormant for 400 years before it erupted on August 2010. There are nearly 130 active volcanoes across the Indonesian archipelago and eruptions are common.
