Kamchatka volcano Shiveluch sends ash column 8.6 kilometres high

Kamchatka’s Shiveluch volcano sent an ash plume as high as 8.6 kilometres into the atmosphere on Saturday morning, September 26, prompting an orange aviation hazard alert, according to the Kamchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team (KVERT).

The ash column rose far above the volcano’s 3.2-kilometre elevation. “The ash plume is spreading westward from the volcano, deeper into the peninsula,” KVERT said.

A small amount of volcanic ash may reach the Tigilskiy municipal district, while earlier ashfall was reported in Klyuchi and Kozyrevsk in the Ust-Kamchatsky municipal district and in Lazo and Taezhny in the Milkovsky municipal district.

Shiveluch is the northernmost active volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula and one of the region’s largest. It is located about 45 kilometres from the settlement of Klyuchi, which has a population of around 5,000.

By Tamilla Hasanova