Popocatépetl: Increasingly Restive...Again

Aerial Photograph of Popocatéptl volcano 45 miles East of Mexico City, July 2013.
The colors...shades of blue, gray, white punctuated with black...and sharp focus make this one of the most beautiful photos I've seen.

Popocatéptl, our local volcano, has been quite active recently. Not every day, but several times a week, we check the CENEPRED (scientific monitoring agency) web site for the report of his latest activity. 

Exhalations, or emissions, of water vapor, gas and ash are common—sometimes as few as twenty or thirty; sometimes close to a hundred in a twenty-four hour period. Occasionally, incandescent material is expelled. But last week, CENEPRED reported extended seismic tremors lasting over several hours and raised the Alert Level from Yellow-Phase 2 to Yellow-Phase 3, and today's report was different. 

Given a break in the cloud cover, a flyover was organized by CENEPRED and conducted by Mexico's Navy. During this flight, it was discovered that a new lava dome is forming inside the crater—most likely the result of the prolonged episodes of tremor reported last week.

It's important to recognize that even in the event of a major eruption, we are fine here in Mexico City—a good 45 miles West of the volcano. Periodically, ash is carried our way by a shift in wind direction. At most, it means we keep the windows shut and stay inside, but we've never had to do that.

But that's just part of the story of this active Mexican volcano. The other part has to do with the indigenous people who live on the volcano's flanks. They live as their parents did, and their grandparents and great-grandparents as far back as anyone knows to remember. It is difficult to imagine how these two entirely different 'worlds'—the modern, scientific, technological world and the millenia-old underlying Mesoamerican spiritualized view of the natural world—manage to co-exist, but they do.

I've written before about El Tiempero, the one who sees and speaks nicely with the volcano, Don Goyo, Popocatéptl, Popo, the Colossus. Antonio Analco is The Tiempero, the shaman of the volcano. 

Given notice of the formation of a new lava dome, I became curious about what El Tiempero is saying. Gotta love the web, in response to my search request, up popped a short article, which I've translated and posted below.

Imagen Radio - In the community of Santiago Xalitzintla, twelve kilometers [slightly over seven miles] from "Don Goyo" and his fumaroles, it might appear that nothing is happening. For the community's inhabitants, there is neither a Yellow-Phase Three Alert nor even the remotest idea of ​​abandoning their lands due to the supposed bad temper of the volcano.

This is due to the calm that emanates from Antonio Analco. Inside the community, he is known as "The Tiempero", the one who can see and talk with Popocatépetl. He tells us that as a child, the volcano took the shape of a ​​man who appeared to him and told him:

"My name is not volcano, I am Gregorio Chino [Curly] Popocatépetl." 

Jenny's Note: Don Goyo is another of the volcano's many names. 'Don' is an honorific used to show respect and 'Goyo' is the nickname for Gregorio.

Don Antonio's role as shaman of the volcano came to him as a legacy from his father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Around here they say that the vents and ash are known only by those who speak with the volcano.

"He and I we see each other, we know each other ... because there is no other."

Although the reality is different for the authorities who arrived from Mexico City, who have assigned Yellow-Phase Three, with the possibility of an explosion of incandescent material. They worry about the possibility of having to evacuate the area.

"It's that the people don't know .... if we're okay."

The alarm would make the church bells ring in the villages near the volcano. The moment might come when the soldiers would evacuate the more than six thousand inhabitants of Santiago, as happened in 1994. Don Antonio insists that he is the only one who will hear the voice of the volcano either in dreams or an apparition on the mountain. Spanish original

Still Curious?

• "El Tiempero: The One Who Sees and Speaks Nicely With Popocatéptl" is based on a charming interview with Don Antonio, El Tiempero;
• "Maintaining Tradition, Villagers Present Offerings to Calm Popocatépetl"; and
• "Mexico's Volcanoes and Mesoamerican Mythology".