Tourists can still visit the surroundings of Taal Volcano — PHIVOLCS

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MANILA — Local and foreign tourists can still visit the surroundings of Taal Volcano, the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) said on Monday.

PhivolcS director Dr. Renato Solidum told the Senate committee on Finance sub-committee D, chaired by Senator Ralph Recto, that visitors can still enjoy boating around Taal Volcano.

He said Taal is misbehaving from time to time making people around the area uneasy as if the volcano is threatening to erupt after showing abnormality due to numbers of volcanic earthquakes.

“People can still go to the island but not inside the crater because of the possibility of toxic gas accumulating like carbon dioxide,” Solidum told the panel as he reminded of the existing Alert Level 1.

He explained that his office is always monitoring all volcanoes but now concentrating on Mayon and Taal.

“Taal is misbehaving since 1990 meaning he is threatening to erupt.

More than a number of volcanic earthquake has been felt in the past days but what was happening is the volcano is fully being inflated,” he pointed out.

On the other hand, he said evacuees from around Mayon Volcano may last up to 90 days in the evacuation centers “until we can say it is safe to return to their homes.”

Right now, he said Mayon Vocano is undergoing a non-explosive phase of eruption “but we are still monitoring it because there is still a possibility that it will change to explosive phase.”

“The pattern of Mayon is after lava flow, there is explosion. Right now magma is still moving up, it came in batches and one of it had been monitored on top. We still see a lot of magma pushing up the slope of volcano that’s why it’s swelling,” he pointed out.

Based on their estimate, the volume should be at least the same as in the 2009 eruption which is 30 million cubic meters. At present, he said the volume is not significant yet and they estimate it only spitted around 2 million cubic meters.

The PhiVolcS chief reminded that the public should remain out the 6-kilometer permanent danger zone and the one-kilometer extended zone southeast of the slope.