Residents leave and flights grounded as volcano erupts in Bali

Volcanic eruptions on the Indonesian island of Bali have prompted officials to cancel flights and move about 24,000 residents out of the way as a thick ash cloud from Mount Agung drifts along the archipelago.

Residents were evacuated from 224 points around the island while Lombok International Airport on Pulau Lombok, the island due east of Bali, has closed temporarily, said Ari Ahsan, spokesman for Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali.

At Ngurah Rai, Bali's main airport, flight cancellations stranded roughly 7,000 domestic and international passengers, according to the airport's latest report.

Indonesia's Center for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation raised its aviation notice from an orange alert to a red one Sunday.

The ash, which began spewing into the sky after Mount Agung in eastern Bali erupted three times on Saturday, has reached heights of 4,000 metres (about 2.5 miles), according to Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, head of information and data for Indonesia's National Disaster Management Agency.

The first eruption came around 5.30pm local time, Bali's Regional Disaster Management Agency said.

More eruptions followed and continued into Sunday, with a "medium-pressure eruption" in the early evening that sent ash 2,000 metres into the air, the agency added.

By late Saturday, the volcanic ash plume had reached an altitude of 7,600 metres (4.7 miles), according to Australia's Bureau of Meteorology.