Secret Japan

[sanji]

Japan, a country located on the Pacific Rim, has one of the highest density of volcanoes in the world. Most of them are found in Hokkaido, on islands south of Tokyo and on Kyushu.

A small map with the main volcanoes in Japan :

Source : http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Imgs/Gif/Japan/Maps/map_japan_volcanoes.gif


109 volcanoes are considered to be in activity or sleeping. The list is available on the Volcanolive web site, with for each of them the position, the altitude, the type of volcano and the dates of the latest eruptions. The site is not extremely graphic, but all those basic information are available.

Alternatively, the Global Volcanism Program site adds a picture of each volcano as well as a text describing its history. This link is highly recommended.


Some volcanoes can be active, but sleeping for a very long time. This is the case for the famous Mount Fuji, whose last activity dates back to 1708. To have an idea of the recent activity of each volcano, head for the Southwest Volcano Research Centre (SWVRC), which updated daily the volcanic activity and the potential threads.
For this, the volcanic activity is labeled by a color and an "Alert Level", using the following scale:
GREEN - Alert Level 0 : Volcano is dormant, normal seismic & fumarolic activity
YELLOW - Alert Level 1 : Volcano is restless; eruption may occur
ORANGE - Alert Levels 2,3 et 4 : Volcano is in eruption or eruption may occur at any time
RED - Level Alert 5 : Significant eruption is occurring or explosive eruption is
expected at any time


Updated 14 January 2010 : 18 volcanoes are active in Japan, all with the status GREEN, except:

ORANGE :
Sakurajima in Kyushu
Suwanose-Jima on the Ryukyu archipelago

YELLOW (JAUNE) :
- none -


Those are the volcanoes that are potentially the most "interesting" to approach.

Even more comprehensive, the Volcano World – Current Volcanic Activity web site lists all the recent news for volcanoes from all around the world.

Finally, on this site page the list of all eruptions in Japan since 1900 is available, as well as the associated human cost.