Japan’s Mount Aso volcano erupts

No reports of injuries after first volcanic eruption since 1980.

Cars covered in volcanic ash outside a driving school in Aso, Kumamoto Prefecture, southern Japan, after Mount Aso erupted on October 8, 2016. Hiroko Harima / Kyodo News via AP

TOKYO // Mount Aso, a volcano on Japan’s main southern island of Kyushu, erupted early on Saturday, spewing volcanic ash 11,000 metres into the sky, Japan’s meteorological agency said.

Police and municipal governments said there were no reports of injuries from the eruption, which began early in the afternoon on one of the peaks of the 1,592-metre mountain in Kumamoto Prefecture.

It was the first “explosive eruption” at the peak since January 1980, according to the agency.

It raised the alert level for the volcano to 3 on a scale of 5 and told people not to approach the mountain and to beware of falling rocks. It also warned of falling ash in 10 prefectures.

Television footage showed volcanic ash had accumulated on cars, houses and roads in the city of Aso and ash was falling as far as 320 kilometres away, Japanese media said.

Farmers reported that some vinyl greenhouses where tomatoes and asparagus were being grown between 6 and 8 kilometres from the crater had been broken by ash and small rocks.

A window was cracked by a falling rock at an Aso youth centre about 5km away from the crater, but there were no reports of injuries, an official at Aso city hall said.

“We are concerned that more damage on crops will be reported,” the official said.

Kyushu Electric Power Co said the eruption had no impact on its Sendai nuclear plant, which is about 160km south of Mount Aso and is one of the two reactors that are online in Japan.

About 29,000 households lost power shortly after the eruption, but the problem was addressed in less than two hours, Kyushu Electric said.

Mount Aso is one of the most active peaks in Japan but is also popular with hikers.

Japan lies on the Ring of Fire, a horseshoe-shaped band of fault lines and volcanoes around the edges of the Pacific Ocean, and is home to more than 100 active volcanoes.

Mount Ontake in central Japan erupted in 2014, killing 63 people in the worst volcanic disaster in Japan for nearly 90 years. Mount Aso also erupted in September last year, blasting a plume of black smoke 2km high.

* Reuters