Puracé Volcano

Puracé's 2026 Orange Alert: What's Happening

The current episode began quietly. From around July 20, 2026, the Los Coconucos volcanic system — the chain Puracé anchors — started showing a steady climb in seismicity and gas output. Instruments picked up volcanic tremor and long-period earthquakes, the signatures of fluids and gas moving beneath the crater, concentrated at depths of less than one kilometer. On August 1, the Servicio Geológico Colombiano (SGC) raised Puracé's alert from Yellow to Orange, citing sustained tremor and changes in sulfur dioxide emissions.

Since the alert change, Puracé has produced repeated ash emissions. Dense columns of gas and ash have risen as high as 3,400 meters above the summit, carrying elevated concentrations of sulfur dioxide (SO₂) and carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the Puracé–Piocollo–Curiquinga complex. In mid-August, SGC bulletins logged multiple discrete ash puffs over single 24-hour windows, with the tallest plumes reaching a few hundred meters above the crater rim and drifting with the wind. The volcano has not entered a large explosive paroxysm — this is low-level eruptive activity riding on top of a clearly restless system.

What does Orange actually mean? On Colombia's four-color scale — Green, Yellow, Orange, Red — Orange is the second-highest step and translates roughly to "probable eruption in a timescale of days to weeks." It is not a declaration that a major eruption is underway. It is a call to activate contingency plans: authorities in Puracé municipality have been identifying temporary shelters and updating plans for the highest-risk zone, and several governments have issued travel advisories for the national park. As of late August, SGC stated the situation did not require an immediate evacuation, but the alert remained at Orange.

Why Popayán Is Watching: The Lahar Threat

For the people living below Puracé, the frightening word isn't "lava" — it's lahar. Puracé is snow-dusted at its summit and drains into river valleys that run toward populated land. In a significant eruption, hot rock and ash can melt ice and mix with water and loose debris to form fast-moving volcanic mudflows that follow those valleys downhill, often far beyond the reach of the eruption itself. SGC has named Puracé, Popayán, and Sotará municipalities as being at risk in a major event, together with the Indigenous reserves of Puracé, Kokonuko, and Paletará. Lahars and ashfall are the phenomena most likely to reach Paletará and the Popayán area.

Colombia does not need to imagine what that looks like. In November 1985, a modest eruption of Nevado del Ruiz — about 320 km north of Puracé — melted part of its ice cap and sent lahars racing down the Lagunilla River. They buried the town of Armero and killed roughly 23,000 people, the deadliest volcanic disaster of the 20th century after Mont Pelée. The eruption was only VEI 3; the death toll came almost entirely from lahars that traveled more than 70 km. That catastrophe reshaped how Colombia monitors its volcanoes and is the reason the SGC treats even "small" Puracé ash emissions as something to watch carefully. You can see how Ruiz ranks among history's worst events on our deadliest eruptions guide.

The point isn't that Puracé is about to repeat Armero. It probably isn't — Puracé's historical eruptions have been far smaller than the ice-clad giants of the northern Cordillera, and its summit ice is limited. The point is that lahar risk scales with downstream population, not just with eruption size, and Popayán has grown. That is precisely the same failure mode that made Fuego's 2018 eruption in Guatemala so deadly and keeps Vesuvius on watch: the hazard follows the valleys, and people live in the valleys.

Eruption History: From 1816 to 2025

Puracé has one of the busier historical records in the northern Andes. Our database holds 29 recorded eruptions for Puracé since documented observations began in 1816 — and 21 of them are VEI 2, so the volcano has a strong tendency to erupt at one moderate size. Only three eruptions in the record reached VEI 3: the largest, in 1847–1852, plus 1869 and 1885. Those explosive events shaped the summit crater we see today. The volcano then produced a dense cluster of eruptions in the mid-20th century — 1946, 1947, 1949, 1956, and 1957 — before its last 20th-century eruption in 1977.

After roughly 45 years of relative quiet, Puracé reawakened: small VEI-1 ash emissions are logged in 2022 and 2023, followed by a larger eruption on January 19, 2025 that dusted ash roughly 7 km from the crater. That renewed unrest set the stage for the 2026 escalation. The table below summarizes the notable eruptions in the record.

VEI figures for Puracé's older eruptions are approximate — most were small explosive or phreatic events rather than the caldera-scale blasts you see at supervolcanoes. You can explore Puracé's full entry, coordinates, and data on its database page.

The Los Coconucos Volcanic Chain

Puracé isn't a lone cone — it's the northwestern end of a remarkable feature. The Los Coconucos Volcanic Chain is a string of nine composite volcanoes and five smaller monogenetic vents stretching more than 6 km southeast from the Puracé crater to the summit of Pan de Azúcar. The whole chain is built on a broad dacitic massif roughly 13 km long. That's why SGC monitors the system as a unit — the "Puracé, Piocollo and Curiquinga" grouping in its bulletins refers to vents along this same chain, and unrest can express itself at more than one of them.

Puracé is andesitic — its magma is stickier and more gas-rich than the fluid basalt of a Hawaiian shield, which is why its eruptions tend to be explosive ash-and-gas events rather than lava fountains. It sits in the Northern Volcanic Zone of the Andes, part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, where the Nazca Plate dives beneath South America and feeds the entire Colombian volcanic front.

Puracé vs. Colombia's Other Volcanoes

Our database lists 14 volcanoes in Colombia, strung along the Cordillera Central from the Ecuador border to the coffee region. Puracé is one of the most consistently active, but it isn't the most dangerous — that title belongs to the ice-capped giants to the north, whose lahars have proven lethal. Here's how the key ones compare, most of them linking to full data pages.

One nearby name deserves a footnote: Galeras, near Pasto. In 1993 a sudden eruption killed nine people, including six scientists who were inside the crater conducting fieldwork — a sobering reminder of why summit access is restricted the moment a volcano like Puracé goes to Orange. For the full regional picture, see our guide to volcanoes in Colombia.

Can You Visit Puracé? Park, Hikes & Safety

In normal times, Puracé National Natural Park is one of the finest high-Andean destinations in Colombia — a páramo of frailejón plants, thermal springs, waterfalls, and one of the best places in the country to spot Andean condors. Guided day hikes toward the summit, arranged through the resident Kokonuko Indigenous community that co-manages the park, are the classic experience.

Right now, though, the summit and upper hazard zone are off-limits while the alert sits at Orange, and both the UK Foreign Office and the US Embassy in Colombia have flagged the area. If you're planning a trip, treat the eruption status as the deciding factor: check SGC bulletins, book only with operators who track official alerts, and be ready to change plans. When Puracé settles back to Yellow or Green, it's a genuinely rewarding hike — but a volcano at Orange is not the place to gamble. For general guidance, see our volcano hiking safety guide, and browse bookable, currently-safe volcano experiences on our volcano tours page.

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