Volcano Survivor: ‘We Had To Go Back To Help'

LILLANI ESCAPED THE ERUPTION BUT HELPED RESCUE THOSE WHO WEREN’T SO LUCKY

- Emma Levett

It had been a morning of realizing dreams for Lillani Hopkins. The 22-year-old geography student had been studying volcanoes for the past five years and wandering around New Zealand’s Whakaari/White Island, home to the volcano, it had been a thrill to experience one first hand.

“Apparently it was more steamy than usual,” Lillani, from Hamilton, NZ, tells New Idea exclusively. “And the lake, which was usually blue was white, [and] covered in ash. But nobody seemed alarmed.” After a morning of adventure, her tour group clambered onto a boat to travel home. Lillani and her father, Geoff, didn’t know it then, but the pair were lucky to have escaped with their lives.

As they drew away from the island, which attracts 10,000 tourists a year, a plume of smoke began pouring from the volcanic crater.

“Someone on our boat gasped and people started screaming ‘look’,” Lillani remembers of the terrifying moments. “I turned and there was a pale grey ash cloud spurting up about 200 meters. I grabbed my camera and within seconds it had turned to a sinister black and it was traveling very fast, rolling over the island.”

Incredibly, Lillani and those around her were witnessing the eruption of Whakaari volcano for the first time in 18 years. And while they were a safe distance away, horrifically there were 47 tourists, including 24 Australians, in the middle of the danger.

“The crew turned the boat around to go back to the island. We could see people on the shore and in the water,” Lillani remembers. “They launched the dinghy and started dragging people on. Dad and I have a first-aid certificate so we and two doctors on board rushed to help.”