TOKYO, Sept. 27 (Xinhua) -- The second anniversary of the devastating eruption of Mount Ontake in central Japan was observed Tuesday with the families of the 63 people who were left dead or missing gathering to pay their respects.
At a ceremony in the town of Kiso in Nagano Prefecture, a movement's silent was observed by mourners comprising the families of the deceased, local residents and officials, at 11:52 a.m. local time, the exact time the eruption occurred two years ago.
The volcanic disaster was Japan's worst post-war volcanic calamity, and the moment was also marked Tuesday by sirens.
Local media showed pictures of the families of the bereaved placing flowers as tributes to the lives lost at the beginning of the mountain's climbing trails.
Kyodo News quoted a 54-year-old man as saying he was planning to climb the mountain after the ceremony in honor of his wife and younger brother who had lost their lives in the disaster two years ago.
He said he would carry his brother's camera to the peak of the mountain and take photos of the scenery, as his brother used to do.
Despite local officials lowering the danger zone to around one kilometer from the volcano's crater and relaxing climbing restrictions, and the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) lowering its alert level for the volcano to 2 on its scale which peaks at 5, local tourism has suffered in the area as a result of the eruption.
Officials said that climbers aside, the mountain's cable car, which runs from the bottom to the middle section of the mountain, has seen numbers of travelers drop by around 50 percent compared to before the eruption.
Around 550 police, firefighters and Self-Defense Forces personnel were called to duty on this day two years ago, when the 3,067-meter volcano, which is situated over both Nagano and Gifu Prefectures, violently erupted before noon, in the middle of the busy hiking season.
The eruption was triggered by a "hydrovolcanic explosion," in which high-pressure water vapor was violently discharged after groundwater was heated by magma, the weather agency said of the eruption.
The agency has warned that this active volcano still has the potential to discharge big rocks from its crater within a roughly 4-kilometer range and that pyroclastic flows could occur, were there to be another seismic incident of a similar scale.
Mount Ontake is a popular destination for both locals and tourists to visit in Japan to view the autumn foliage and is located about 210 kilometers west of Tokyo, the eruption two years ago, was the first one that caused fatalities since 1979.
The eruption came at what police described then as being the worst possible time as hundreds of people were taking advantage of the temperate and clear weather to take a hike when the eruption, which initially spewed large white plumes of gas and ash hundreds of meters into the sky, caused day to become night and covered the entire area in an ominous layer of foreboding black ash.
In mere minutes a perfect day out morphed into a tragic nightmare for hundreds of hikers and day-trippers who were helplessly trapped on the slopes, many of them having to endure the harsh conditions overnight.
People who survived the deadly eruption said they were peppered with huge rocks before they realized what was happening. Those who were not far from buildings, like lodges, sprinted for cover, until the vicious and constant bombardment by large rocks eventually ceased.
As of Tuesday the weather agency here has maintained its warning level of 2, stating that hikers should not approach the mountain's crater.
