More than 1,500 people have fled their homes in southern Chile after the Chaiten volcano erupted, throwing a huge cloud of ash and lava into the sky.

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The volcano, 800 miles south of the capital Santiago, had not erupted for more than 450 years and was considered dormant.

But it is now belching enormous clouds of thick ash that have drifted across a large area in both Chile and the Argentine province of Chubut, where an airport was forced to close.

Just six miles away, the town of Chaiten has a population of 7,000. Long used to the menacing form of the 3,000-foot mountain, it is now overshadowed by a towering column of ash.

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