Mount Merapi on 22 November 1994, mostly in the town of Muntilan, west of the volcano. Another large eruption occurred in 2006, shortly before the Yogyakarta earthquake. In light of the hazards that Merapi poses to populated areas, it has been designated as one of the Decade Volcanoes. On 25 October 2010 the Indonesian government raised the alert for Mount Merapi to its highest level and warned villagers in threatened areas to move to safer ground. People living within the range of a zone were told to evacuate. Officials said about 500 volcanic earthquakes had been recorded on the mountain over the
2010 eruptions of Mount Merapi suffering from serious depression and anxiety, while one man had committed suicide, reportedly due to stress. On Thursday, 18 November the Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs issued a second update to their 11 November travel advisory bulletin acknowledging the announcement by Indonesian authorities on 15 November scaling back the 20 kilometre exclusion zone in some of the regions around Mount Merapi. The exclusion zone had been reduced to in the District (Kabupaten) of Magelang and to in the Districts of Klaten and Boyolali. The exclusion zone in the District of Sleman, towards the city of Yogyakarta, remained at .