Mount Ontake
Volcanic mountain on the island of Honshu, Japan
title: "Mount Ontake" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["volcanic-crater-lakes", "mountains-of-gifu-prefecture", "mountains-of-nagano-prefecture", "sacred-mountains-of-japan", "volcanoes-of-honshū", "volcanoes-of-gifu-prefecture", "volcanoes-of-nagano-prefecture", "shugendō", "mountain-faith"] description: "Volcanic mountain on the island of Honshu, Japan" topic_path: "geography/japan" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Ontake" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Volcanic mountain on the island of Honshu, Japan ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox mountain"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Mount Ontake |
| photo | Kiso Ontake.jpg |
| photo_caption | Viewed from Kuzo Pass of Route 361 |
| map | Japan |
| map_caption | Japan |
| location | Gifu and Nagano, Chūbu region, Japan |
| label_position | bottom |
| elevation_m | 3067 |
| elevation_ref | |
| prominence_m | 1712 |
| prominence_ref | |
| listing | Ultra, Ribu |
| 100 famous mountains in Japan | |
| coordinates | |
| topo | Geographical Survey Institute, 25000:1 御嶽山, 50000:1 御嶽山 |
| coordinates_ref | |
| type | Stratovolcano |
| last_eruption | October 2014 |
| other_name | 御嶽山 |
| :: |
| name = Mount Ontake | photo = Kiso Ontake.jpg | photo_caption = Viewed from Kuzo Pass of Route 361 | map = Japan | map_caption = Japan | location = Gifu and Nagano, Chūbu region, Japan | label_position = bottom | elevation_m = 3067 | elevation_ref = | prominence_m = 1712 | prominence_ref = | listing = Ultra, Ribu 100 famous mountains in Japan | range = | coordinates = | topo = Geographical Survey Institute, 25000:1 御嶽山, 50000:1 御嶽山 | coordinates_ref = | type = Stratovolcano | age = | last_eruption = October 2014 | first_ascent = | easiest_route = | other_name = 御嶽山 | map_size =
Mount Ontake, also referred to as Mount Kiso Ontake, is the 14th-highest mountain and second-highest volcano in Japan (after Mount Fuji) at 3067 m. It is included in Kyūya Fukada's 1964 book 100 Famous Japanese Mountains.
Description
Mt. Ontake is located around 100 km northeast of Nagoya, and around 200 km west of Tokyo, at the borders of Kiso and Ōtaki, Nagano and Gero, Gifu. The volcano has five volcanic crater lakes, with Ni no Ike at 2905 m being the highest mountain lake in Japan.
Ontake is a major sacred mountain, and following shugendō practices, actors and artists have gone to the mountain to put themselves into trances to get divine inspiration for their creative activities.
Eruptions
Ontake was thought to be inactive until October 1979, when it underwent a series of explosive phreatic eruptions which ejected 200,000 tons of ash, and had a volcanic explosivity index (VEI) of 2. There were minor non-explosive (VEI 0) phreatic eruptions in 1991 and 2007.
On September 27, 2014, at around 11:53 a.m. Japan Standard Time (UTC +9), the volcano erupted with a VEI of 3. The eruption was phreatic—caused by groundwater flashing to steam in a hydrothermal explosion—and there were no significant earthquakes that might have warned authorities in the lead up to it. The eruption was an extremely rare phenomenon, which made it difficult to take precautionary measures. At the time of the eruption, several hiking parties were undertaking ascents and descents of Ontake, with emergency descents having to be undertaken in the presence of ash clouds and falling rocks. 63 people were killed; five bodies were never found.
Gallery
|title= Mount Ontake |mode = packed |File:Mount Ontake from Kurakake Pass.JPG|Mount Ontake seen from Kurakake Pass on October 11, 2014. |File:Ontake-san-from-Kiso-Valley-2019-Luka-Peternel.jpg|Mount Ontake from Kiso Valley
References
References
- "Mountains altitude list in Japan(Gifu prefecture)". Geospatial Information Authority of Japan.
- [http://www.peaklist.org/WWlists/ultras/japan.html "Japan Ultra-Prominences"]. Peaklist.org. Retrieved March 20, 2013.
- {{cite gvp
- (1997). "Sacred Mountains of the World". University of California Press.
- link. Japan Meteorological Agency
- (September 27, 2014). "御嶽山が噴火 火口から４キロ程度は警戒を". [[NHK]].
- "御嶽山噴火、７人が灰に埋まる 山に残留４４人 警察庁". [[Asahi Shimbun]].
- "3 buried under volcanic ash". [[NHK]].
- (28 September 2014). "Experts warn of further eruptions". [[NHK]].
- (29 September 2014). "Why Japan missed volcano's warning signs". Nature: International Weekly Journal of Science.
- (29 September 2014). "Japan volcano Ontake an extremely rare eruption". Australian Geographic.
- (2014-09-28). "Japan volcano: Mt Ontake rescue teams find 31 bodies". BBC News.
- (28 September 2018). "Mount Ontake: Four years after its deadly eruption". The Japan Times.
::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::