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Philippines' Taal volcano erupts but alert level low

Taal is one of the world's smallest active volcanoes and some of its previous eruptions have impacted the capital and air travel

Published: Wed 2 Oct 2024, 2:29 PM

Updated: Wed 2 Oct 2024, 3:29 PM

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  • Reuters

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This handout photo courtesy of X (formerly Twitter) user @markymarksworld on September 22, 2023, shows smog from Taal Volcano hanging over Tagaytay city in Cavite Province. — AFP file

This handout photo courtesy of X (formerly Twitter) user @markymarksworld on September 22, 2023, shows smog from Taal Volcano hanging over Tagaytay city in Cavite Province. — AFP file

The Philippines' Taal Volcano near the capital region has erupted, spewing a plume of steam that was more than 2km high, the seismology agency said on Wednesday.

Taal, located about 70km south of central Manila, is one of the world's smallest active volcanoes and some of its previous eruptions have impacted the capital and air travel.

The agency's chief Teresito Bacolcol described the eruption as phreatomagmatic, where magma interacts with water and produces a plume of steam.

The volcano sits inside a large lake near the town of Tagaytay in Cavite province.

"This phreatomagmatic eruption was limited at the volcano island. We're looking whether there's ashfall in the eastern side, but there's no evacuation yet," Bacolcol said by phone.

Bacolcol said the alert level remained at the lowest on the scale and there were no immediate reports of injuries.

Despite standing at only 311 metres, it can be deadly and an eruption in 1911 killed more than 1,300 people.

In July 2021, thousands of people were evacuated after it spewed a 1km high plume of gas and steam.

A year earlier, the Taal volcano shot a column of ash and steam as high as 15km into the sky, forcing more than 100,000 people to abandon their homes and triggered widespread disruption in the capital.



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