Heightened alert at Mount Asama

The Japan Meteorological Agency has raised the alert level for Mount Asama, the most active of Honshu’s many volcanoes, after detecting increased seismic activity.

Press reports quote JMA official Sadayuki Kitagawa as warning that ‘Mount Asama could erupt within two days, spewing rocks and ash’, and that ‘there are prospects for an eruption that could thrown volcanic rocks to a distance of around 4 kilometres’. Up to 45,000 people could be affected by the current alert, and local officials are warning people to be ready for evacuation.

Asama has erupted frequently in recent years, most recently in September 2004, but without fatalities or widespread destructive effects. The volcano’s last destructive eruption was in May-August 1783, a VEI4 event which devastated 500 square kilometres and left around 1200 people dead.

Image: ”Earthquake and Eruption of the Mountain of Asama-yama, in the province of Sinano’, from Isaac Titsingh, Illustrations of Japan: Consisting of Private Memoirs and Anecdotes of the Reigning Dynasty of the Djogouns, or Sovereigns of Japan (London, 1822). Courtesy of the University of Texas Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin. [Source]

News
Japan warns of eruptions at volcano – International Herald Tribune, 1 February 2009
Japan on heightened alert for Mount Asama eruption – Reuters, 1 February 2009
Japan warns of volcano eruption within 48 hours – Telegraph.co.uk, 1 February 2009

Information
Global Volcanism Program: Asama – summary information for Asama (0803-11=)
Japan Meteorological Agency – English-language homepage for the JMA
Volcano Research Center, University of Tokyo – English-language homepage for the VRC