With its summit covered in snow for most of the year, Mount Fuji is perhaps one of the most iconic and well-known landscapes in Japan. However, this year the whitish spectacle is slow to arrive. The first snowfall after summer occurs at the beginning of October, but to date the top is still “bare”. “It is the first time in 130 years, that is, since we began monitoring this data, that Mount Fuji remains without snow for so long,” say experts from the Kofu Local Meteorological Office, in a report in AFP picked up by The Japan Times.
Record without snowfall
2024 breaks the previous record set in 1995 and 2016, when the first dusting of snow arrived on October 26. Last year, snow whitened the summit until October 5, but most of it disappeared in early November due to high temperatures, CNN indicates.
Although its last eruption dates back 300 years, Mount Fuji is still classified as an active volcano. It is located in the central part of the island of Honshu and is the highest mountain in Japan at 3,776 meters. It is visible from Tokyo on fog-free days. In addition to its territorial value, it is considered a sacred place in Japanese culture and was recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2013. Although extreme temperatures are not an endemic phenomenon, Japan faces multiple impacts in winter regions; For example, the city of Sapporo is considering reducing its famous festival due to the lack of it.
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Although the exact cause of the fatal sinking of the Bayesian superyacht is still unknown, dangerous waterspouts were sighted in the area. Scientists say they may become much more common.
A particularly hot summer
According to experts, the extreme heat that has characterized the summer in Japan; and in many other countries around the world this year, is responsible for the late appearance of snow on Mount Fuji. “This summer the temperatures were high and lasted until September, preventing the arrival of cold air for the near future,” explains Yutaka Katsuta, meteorologist at the Kofu Local Meteorological Office to the newspaper. Japan Times. According to BBC, The summer that just passed and that of 2023 were the hottest in Japan since these data were recorded, with temperatures almost 1.8 °C higher than the average between June and August.
At the time, Japanese meteorologists suggested that the anomalous heat would last until October. The non-profit organization Climate Central indicated that in the first weeks of October, at least 74 Japanese cities recorded temperatures between 5 and 8 degrees Celsius higher than the average for this period between 1991 and 2020.
Article originally published in WIRED Italy. Adapted by Alondra Flores.
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