CASTRO (Chile), May 3: Chilean authorities were evacuating the last of thousands of residents from the vicinity of a volcano in southern Chile on Saturday, as it continued to spew fine ash for a second day after a surprise eruption.

Around 3,900 people have been evacuated from the Patagonian town of Chaiten and its surroundings since Friday, with another 500 waiting for boats to take them to the town of Castro on the island of Chiloe, slightly further north and Puerto Montt on the mainland.

Some are staying in guesthouses, while schools have been turned into makeshift shelters packed with stores of bottled water after the ash contaminated ground water supplies.—Reuters