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Japan News

Japan's Mt. Ontake Erupts, Stranding Hundreds of Hikers 41

Posted by Soulskill from the get-home-safely dept.
An anonymous reader writes: Japan's second highest volcano, Mount Ontake, erupted on Saturday, sending thick clouds of ash into the air. More than 250 hikers were in the area, and the ash and rocks left seven unconscious, eight injured, and all of them stranded. In video footage from the mountain, you can see the thick clouds overtaking hikers, blocking out the sun and coating them with ash. There have been no reports of lava flows, but flights in the area were forced to divert their routes. (Another video shows the ash clouds from the sky.)
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Japan's Mt. Ontake Erupts, Stranding Hundreds of Hikers More

Japan's Mt. Ontake Erupts, Stranding Hundreds of Hikers

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  • let me save you the visit to the chiropractor (Score:5, Informative)

    by v1 ( 525388 ) on Saturday September 27, 2014 @09:40AM (#48008699) Homepage Journal

    thankfully someone turned this one right-side-up

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Definitely a shit-your-pants moment, especially when you've heard about pyroclastic flows [wikipedia.org] before.

  • Why didn't they hide in that kind of shed or under the rocks next to it instead of going in the middle of an open area?
    If they wanted to leave, they should have made a better effort and walked much faster than this instead of pausing to take pictures and discuss it between them.

    • Ever been in an earthquake before?

    • The gas is going to get to you anyway, it's not a bullet.

    • Re:Why didn't they seek protection? (Score:5, Informative)

      by JanneM ( 7445 ) on Saturday September 27, 2014 @12:07PM (#48009265) Homepage

      The video is deceiving; that trail is much steeper than it looks. Slowly stumbling downwards is pretty much all they could do. Also, most deaths from eruptions are either from poisonous gas or from heat. A small hut will shield you from neither. But both gas concentration and heat will disspiate by distance, so simply trying to get away from it may well be your best chance to survive.

      • No way you'd outrun the pyroclastic flow from a major eruption. And if it's just a fart then running around on the side of a mountain when you can't see anything isn't exactly a brilliant idea.

        • No way you'd outrun the pyroclastic flow from a major eruption.

          If it's travelling much more than walking pace, no. (Some pyroclastic flows, particularly underwater ones, travel quite slowly. But a warm (70degC) lahar can kill you as dead as a hot (700degC) nuees ardente. "Pyroclastic flow" covers a wide range of phenomena, including but not limited to ignimbrites and nuees ardentes.)

          One characteristic that they do all have is that they have a higher density than the surrounding air (or water). If they didn

    • What do you expect from a bunch of Japanese tourists?

  • If it were me I'd be looking to get my ass off the volcano ASAP.

  • Toss in a few virgins to placate the volcano gods and this wouldn't have happened.
  • If I saw that cloud erupting, I would basically mentally prep myself for death -- that cloud had the look of one of those fast moving steaming hot pyroclastic flows. So lucky for them it wasn't...
    • Yeah, there was green flashes in that smoke at it's thickest part - looked scary. I'm not sure how I would have reacted, but standing around filming wouldn't have been my first thought.

      Is anyone here learned in this type of event, that would like to give us all a practical idea of what to do in case you're in this situation?
      • If you ever find yourself in that situation, wet a rag or the front of your shirt and hold it over your mouth, this will act as a filter for ash and you should still be able to breathe.

      • Yeah, there was green flashes in that smoke at it's thickest part

        Lightening within the cloud.

        Is anyone here learned in this type of event, that would like to give us all a practical idea of what to do in case you're in this situation?

        As I said up-thread, first thing is not to be there. That's not applicable in this event as there does not appear to have been any significant warning.

        Second thing - the clouds (nuees ardentes) have two components - a high-density flow of extremely hot rock, steam and air whi

  • Yes, Mount Ontake is Japan's second highest. In Japan, volcano is everywhere but guess what is hightest. It's Mount Fuji. Have a look at Historic eruptions of Mount Fuji [wikipedia.org] and there is no garantee that there will be forerunning phenomena of eruptions. Besides, evacuation drill of Mt. Fuji has never been conducted.
    It's really unfortunate the eruption occurs at most crowded days, but Mt. Fuji has more than ten thousand visitors a day, when crowded season.
    • The whole of Japan is what we refer to as a volcanic island arc. Essentially the whole chain is volcanoes, or eroding volcanoes, which will be covered over by more volcanoes in due course. It's been like that for tens of millions of years if not longer (I've only drilled bits of the area to about 25 million years, approximately), and it'll remain the same ... until probably fragments of Hawaii, the Marshalls and the Windwards hit, shortly followed by California. Say a couple of hundred millions of years. An

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