At least 17 people were killed and 40 injured when one of the world's most active volcanoes erupted on Indonesia's Java island, spewing clouds of hot ash, health officials and media reports said early Wednesday.
Metro TV reported that thousands of people fled in trucks and cars after Mount Merapi started spewing hot ash and volcanic rocks just before dusk, a day after authorities raised an alert status to the highest level, dpa reported.
Television footage showed residents, most wearing masks, being taken away in trucks with windscreens covered by dust. Many of the residents had earlier refused to leave their homes.
"This is an initial phase of an eruption," said Subandrio, head of the Volcanic Technology Development and Research Centre in Yogyakarta, who like many Indonesians uses only one name.
Metro TV reported that 16 badly burned bodies were found near the house of Mbah Marijan, the man known as the keeper of the mountain, who had refused to leave his home.
Officials at Sardjito and Panti Nugroho hospitals in the city of Yogyakarta, near the volcano, confirmed that 12 bodies had been brought in, while 40 injured people were treated.
The Jakarta-based Vivanews.com news website confirmed that one of its reporters was among the dead.
A 3-month-old baby was dead on the way to Muntilan Hospital in Magelang district, said an official who feared that the death toll could continue to rise.
Vulcanologist Surono said three explosions were heard around 6 pm (1100 GMT), and Merapi spewed clouds of black smoke 1,500 metres into the sky.
The state-run Antara news agency reported that Merapi's volcanic dust fell as far as Cilacap district, more than 100 kilometres west of the eruption.
On Monday, authorities began moving children and elderly people to some 60 emergency shelters after scientists upgraded the alert status as lava flowing down the cone's slopes reached 4.5 kilometres.
Tents, blankets and plastic sheeting were distributed to dozens of evacuation points around Yogyakarta and Central Java provinces, said Arief Setyo Hadi, an official with the Indonesian Red Cross.
Officials estimated up to 40,000 people were living in the endangered areas.
The 2,968-metre volcano last erupted in 2006, killing two people.
Its most deadly eruption on record occurred in 1930, when 1,370 people were killed.
At least 66 people were killed in a 1994 eruption.