VIDEO: Volcano awakens after 500 years — Should we be worried?
A volcano in Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula erupted Sunday for the first time in six centuries, authorities said, sending a massive ash plume eastward toward the Pacific Ocean.
The regional office of Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry said the Krasheninnikov volcano, located in the country’s Far East, saw an eruption plume rise to 6,000 meters (19,685 feet), citing data from the Kamchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team (KVERT).
“There are no populated areas along the path of the ash cloud,” the ministry said in a statement on Telegram, adding that no ashfall had been reported in nearby settlements and no tourist groups were currently in the area.
The 1,856-meter (6,089-foot) volcano has now been assigned an “orange” aviation hazard code, signalling heightened risk to aircraft due to volcanic ash in the atmosphere. Authorities advised against travelling to the area or attempting to climb the volcano.
“This is the first historical eruption of the Krasheninnikov volcano in 600 years,” said Olga Girina, head of KVERT, in comments to Russian state news agency RIA.
According to researchers, the last lava flow occurred around 1463, and Krasheninnikov has been inactive since then, Reuters reports.
Girina said the eruption may be linked to a powerful 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck off Kamchatka’s coast last Wednesday, triggering tsunami warnings across the Pacific, including in Chile.
The Russian Academy of Sciences said it was the strongest quake in the region since 1952. The same day, the academy reported an eruption at Klyuchevskoy volcano, one of the most active in Eurasia, located about 160 kilometres (99.4 miles) north of Krasheninnikov.
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