Today in Japan, Dec 16 ~ Eruption!

And here is your daily almanac for Friday the sixteenth of December 2022.

Today, in 1707 Mt Fuji erupted.

It happened on the southeast side, at the Hōei site. Black smoke started steaming out and this soon turned much worse. There was no lava flow, but over 800 million cubic meters of ash and pumice was shot out. It rained this material as far away as Edo (modern day Tokyo) and Yokohama. The eruption continued for two weeks and in that time it buried nearby houses and fields in ash. Many people were buried by ash, and many more died from starvation resulting from everything around being destroyed. This eruption is thought to have been the worst ash-fall disaster in Japanese history.

It's believed that the eruption was caused by a 8.6 earthquake that occurred just 49 days prior. The crater of this eruption can be visited today and is a relatively popular site. Experts believe if it happened again, it would affect some 30 million people and cause huge damage. Due to this fear, mount Fuji is watched 24/7.

^{Estimated fallout if it happens again}

Today is Senbu, one of the rokuyō, the Buddhist horoscope. (Read more about the rokuyō here) This day is bad luck in the morning and good in the afternoon. Stay safe!

On the old calendar, today would have been the twenty-third day of the eleventh month. It is kuma ana ni nimoru, "Bears start their hibernation", the second microseason of Taisetsu

Not only bears, but many other animals are said to start their hibernation around now. It's getting colder and colder as the dead of winter is nearing.

Here's a haiku from Chiyo-ni:

雪の夜やひとり釣瓶の落る音
yuki no yo ya hitori tsurube no otsuru oto

snowy night—
a sound of a well bucket
falling by itself

This is an easy one to imagine. It probably was a snowy night and that snow filled the well bucket, causing it to fall. People in her day were probably used to such things happening.

^{Snow Scene by Uehara Konen}