MOUNT Kanlaon in Negros island shot a huge column of ash into the sky on Saturday, prompting the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology to warn aircraft to stay away.
Kanlaon, a stratovolcano only 30 km from Bacolod City, launched a plume of whitish-grey ash about 1.5 kilometers into the air, said Kenn John Veracruz of the official Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology.
The civil aviation office issued an advisory, saying “flights operating in the vicinity of the volcano are advised to avoid flying close to the summit as airborne ash from a sudden eruption can be hazardous to aircraft.”
Veracruz said that so far the authorities had not detected any lava rising inside the 2.47-kilometer high volcano but they were checking how far the ash was being scattered by the wind and whether it could affect nearby communities.
“It has been raining in recent days so there was likely water that built up inside the volcano and since the crater is hot, it built up the steam pressure,” causing the eruption of ash, Veracruz, a member of the institute’s volcano monitoring division, told AFP.
He added that it was possible the volcano could experience another ash eruption.
The civil defence office said they had not received any reports of damage or people affected from the ashfall but that authorities remain on alert.
The volcano has been restive since 2015 when it had a small, steam-driven explosion on Nov. 23. On Dec. 12, Kanlaon had two low-energy ash eruptions. On Dec. 27, an ash eruption occurred at Kanlaon’s active crater with the eruption plume reaching as high as 1,000 meters.
On March 29, Kanlaon again erupted for 12 minutes, producing a volcanic plume 1,500 meters above the crater and a “booming sound” was heard in some barangays near the volcano.
Kanlaon is the most active volcano in the Visayas and has erupted 28 times since 1919. Eruptions are typically phreatic explosions of small-to-moderate size that produce minor ash falls near the volcano.
Kanlaon has had several eruptions, usually of ash, in the past century, leading the government to impose a permanent four-kilometre “danger zone” around the volcano where people are barred from living.
In August, 1996, the volcano abruptly erupted, sending a spray of heated rocks that killed three hikers who were near the summit at the time.