Efforts to pump away Indonesian mud eruption fail again

Technicians in Indonesia struggling to divert a vast mud flow into the sea failed again in their attempts to move the noxious sludge by pump, an official said.

"The mud is too thick. Ideally for the pump to work well, the composition should be 70 per cent water and 30 per cent mud," a technician working on the pump told ElShinta radio.

"Now the composition is the other way around. If we force it, the mud will clog the pipe and pump," he said.

Technicians have been working around the clock since Tuesday, but attempts to stem the flow the mud have been unsuccessful.

Rudi Novrianto, spokesman for the national team handling the crisis said Friday that any rain at this stage would loosen up the mud and make it easier to pump through a 1.5-kilometre long pipe to the river.

"We have to pump water from the river to mix with the mud, so it can be sucked by the pump to then flow into the river. Excavators on pontoons are now working to mix water with the mud," Mr Novrianto said.

The team is installing another stretch of pipe parallel to the current pipeline and will bring in additional pumps after any success with the mud diversion.

The sulfuric mud, which began spewing from the ground near a gas drilling site in May, is erupting at a rate of 126,000 cubic metres a day and has affected eight villages and displaced some 12,000 people.

There are now fears that impending monsoon rains will breach hastily-constructed dykes meant to contain the mud, which has become at least 10 metres deep in the worst-hit areas, threatening more villages in the heavily-populated district of Sidoarjo.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has ordered the mud be diverted to a nearby Porong river and the sea.

Experts have said they cannot predict when or if the mud will stop seeping from the ground.

The drilling company that was working at the site, and which is owned by the family of the Indonesian Welfare Minister, has denied it is to blame and says an earthquake nearby may have caused the phenomenon.

However, Mr Yudhoyono has ordered the firm to pay at least 1.5 trillion rupiah ($US164 million) to deal with the mess.

- AFP