It’s a sleepy town of just under 4,000, with goats grazing along the main road, roosters greeting the day and a behemoth volcano belching out smoke and lava 17,000 feet up.
San Pedro Benito Juárez has been living side by side with the volcano Popocatépetl for a while, but starting in 1994, the volcano reawakened and has had short periods of activity. Last May, the largest eruption in a decade forced federal officials to declare a “yellow alert stage 3” with potential evacuations.
“I don’t think we have the time to go somewhere because we are too near,” said Mauricio Vasquez Osorio, who owns a store at the edge of town and near the foot of “El Popo,” as the volcano is called by locals. “Of course, tenemos miedo (we are afraid).”
The 17,797-foot mountain is just 45 miles from Mexico City and near 25 million people. Its name is Nahuatl, the language of the Aztec/Mexica people, and means “smoking mountain.”
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Federal officials lowered the alert level back to “yellow phase two” this summer, but there still is increased activity.
“This year it erupted more than usual,” said Jose Montes, who moved back to San Pedro Benito Juarez from the U.S. 12 years ago and was quickly reminded of the volcano’s activity. “I was just annoyed. I’m used to the volcano, used to it erupting and making noise, but the ash – waking up and everything being gray was just annoying.”
When he first moved back, Montes said, he was frightened that he wouldn’t be able to escape if there was a large eruption. Now, he lives with the threat and the consequences.
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“After being here for 12 years, if God wants to take us, just let them take us,” said Montes. “How far can we get?”
There is only one way in and one way out of the town. After 30 years of eruptions, most locals are have adopted a mantra they live by.
“Now, people say, ‘No pasa nada (nothing happens),’” said Osorio.
“No pasa nada” sums up years of explosions, but never the “big one.”
It has been exactly 1,200 years since that last cataclysmic eruption of Popocatépetl.
Still, residents like Julia Martinez Matamoros, who owns a small store on the main road, say the volcano is calm again.
Matamoros’ adult children live in the U.S. would like her to move, but she is not budging: “It calmed down. No pasa nada.”
