Haunting images show how volcano turned this Guatemalan town into a cemetery
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694630-volcano-1-1.jpg?im=Resize=(400))
The volcano rumbled to life early on Sunday, June 3. By midday, it was spewing ash in smoking columns miles high that then fell, dusting a wide swath of the Central American country.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694629-volcano-3.jpg)
But with the mountain`s rumbles and the first ash showers, many villagers made a fatal bet to stay put, gambling that luck that had protected them for decades would hold once again.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694633-volcano-5.jpg)
By the time most families in the worst-hit hamlets of El Rodeo and San Miguel de Los Lotes knew what was happening, they only had time to run, if that.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694631-volcano-4.jpg)
There was no time to eat. Sunday family lunches were interrupted, the food left on the table.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694638-volcano-11.jpg)
Children abandoned toys...
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694637-volcano-9.jpg)
...and clothes still hung on lines in backyards.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694635-volcano-8.jpg)
In one home, the pages of a Bible are singed. Outside, cattle lay dead. A bass drum lay abandoned. In kitchens, there was food in pots ready to be served.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694634-volcano-6.jpg)
Where once there was life, there is heat, dust and a lingering smell of sulfur.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694636-volcano-7.jpg)
Now, everything in the previously lush, bright green landscape is coated in thick layers of sepia-colored volcanic ash, giving the place the eerie feeling of a ghost ship.
![](https://english.cdn.zeenews.com/sites/default/files/2018/06/13/694639-volcano-10.jpg)
Many lost 10 to 50 relatives each, descendents of intertwining generations of a small families who settled in Los Lotes more than 40 years ago. They refuse to give up hope of finding relatives - or at least their remains.
(All images and text: Reuters)
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