Mount Kanlaon on the central island of Negros erupted shortly before 7:00 p.m. (1100 GMT), prompting warnings for nearby residents to wear facemasks due the threat of volcanic gases and falling ash.
“When it erupted we heard a thunder-like sound,” Ethan Asentista-Khoo, 35, said from his home in Pula village near the volcano.
“There was like a fire on the mouth of the volcano, which lasted around one to two minutes. I didn’t see any lava or rocks coming out.”
The Philippines is located in the seismically active Pacific “Ring of Fire” that hosts more than half of the world’s volcanoes.
Kanlaon is one of 24 active volcanoes in the archipelago nation.
Eruptions can be deadly, with pyroclastic and lahar flows as well as ashfall posing hazards to communities surrounding the volcano.A rumbling volcano in the central Philippines shot a huge column of ash into the sky on Saturday, prompting the official aviation agency to warn aircraft to stay away, authorities said.
Mount Kanlaon, located in the central island of Negros, launched a plume of whitish-grey ash about 1.5 km 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.”
The volcano, located about 510 km south of Manila, has been more active than usual since November, prompting the government to ban hikers from its slopes.
Veracruz said that so far the authorities had not detected any lava rising inside the 2.47-km 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 defense office said they had not received any reports of damage or people affected from the ashfall but that authorities remain on alert.Philippine villagers near a restive volcano on a central island are bracing for possible evacuations that would require physical distancing because of the coronavirus pandemic, an official said Wednesday.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said it detected dozens of small earthquakes on the western flank of Kanlaon volcano, which emitted plumes of steam up to 300 meters in the air overnight. Kanlaon on Negros island is one of about two dozen active volcanoes in the Philippines.
Those signs, along with a slight bulging of Kanlaon’s slope, “indicate that hydrothermal or magmatic activity is occurring beneath the edifice,” the institute said. It added that the volcano “is at an abnormal condition and has entered a period of unrest.”
Zeaphard Caelian, who heads the disaster response agency in Negros Occidental province, said authorities issued an initial alert in March after Kanlaon began showing signs of restiveness, which intensified last weekend.
More than 20,000 people in eight villages within 6 to 12 kilometers of Kanlaon would have to be evacuated if the volcano shows signs of an imminent eruption. Officials are identifying evacuation centers where physical distancing could to be observed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, Caelian said.
The Philippines has reported more than 32,000 confirmed coronavirus infections, including 1,204 deaths, among the highest in Southeast Asia.
The volcano-monitoring institute warned the public from venturing into a permanent four-kilometer danger zone around Kanlaon due to possible sudden eruptions of steam. It advised airplanes to avoid flying close to the summit of the 2,465-meter mountain.
