Three airports on Indonesia's main island of Java reopened Saturday, an official said, following the volcanic eruption of Mount Kelud that killed three people and displaced thousands, according to dpa. The airports in Malang, East Java and Semarang and Cilacap in Central Java have reopened, while four others remained closed, said Bambang Ervan, spokesman for the Transportation Ministry. "The other airports are still closed for cleaning and while we evaluate their status," Ervan said. The authorities declared a 10-kilometre radius exclusion zone and thousands of villagers were still sheltered in evacuation centres on the eastern side of the island. The volcano has stopped erupting but white smoke was still billowing up to 3 kilometres high from its crater. Ervan said that the Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre had declared Indonesian air space clean from volcanic ash. Juanda international airport in East Java could open later Saturday, while Bandung airport in West Java will reopen Sunday, Ervan said. "The volcano ceased spewing ash and rock but airports are still blanketed by volcanic ash and air transport operations remain grounded," Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for the National Disaster Mitigation Agency, said earlier in the day. He said airport operators were still cleaning up their facilities while waiting for results of evaluations by authorities before they could resume normal activities. The two airports in the capital Jakarta were still open, as well as the one on the resort island of Bali, officials said.
