Current State and Future Goals of Research on Volcanic Disaster in Japan

Abstract:

A small phreatic eruption at Mount Ontake in 2014, which occurred without raising of the Volcanic Alert Level (VAL) and with >60 casualties, was the most epoch-making event in Japan during 2010-2020, having a strong social impact. National university corporation in 2004 had gradually made it difficult to maintain volcano-observatories, observation stations and instruments with the technical staff in the universities. Instead, the weight of monitoring by the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) became larger. The Ontake event exposed incompleteness of VAL by JMA, and its countermeasures progressed in the national level; that is, volcanic disaster prevention councils on all active volcanoes of participation of researchers, strengthening monitoring staff in JMA, timely and easy understandable volcano information, enlightenment of volcanic disaster etc. 10-years national project, "Integrated Program for Next Generation Volcano Research and Human Resource Development" (INeVRH) was launched in 2016, to promote observation, forecasting and countermeasures research by utilizing the data centralized system (Japan Volcanological Database Network, JVDN) installed in a national research institute (NIED).

Disaster prevention organizations such as JMA are independent from research institutes and universities, and volcanic disaster countermeasures taken by local governments link directly to the VAL without hazard assessment and risk assessment processes. Misleading due to overestimation/underestimation of VAL might create a serious social problem, especially in case of large eruptions. The ongoing INeVRH project aims to filling the gap between the evaluation of volcanic state by observation and measures taken by stakeholders. Since no large-huge eruptions have occurred in Japan during the past ~100 years, well-preparedness based on our research result is needed to minimize damages from ash fall in urban areas from them. For the coming decade, not only volcanological research to clarify the mechanisms of eruptions but also simulation and statistic research, related to hazard and disaster risk assessment with social scientists, become essential.