Real-time simulation and analysis on long-range atmospheric dispersions of volcanic gases discharged from the Miyake Island

Furuno, Akiko   ; Nagai, Haruyasu  ; Umeyama, Nobuaki; Chino, Masamichi

The active volcano Oyama in the Miyake Island has been emitting a huge amount of volcanic gases since the first eruption in July 2000. High concentrations of SO2 gas originated in Oyama frequently appear in the wide area from the northeast to the west part of Honshu, Japan. This paper describes real-time prediction of SO2 dispersion covering the Tokai and Kanto District and its verification by comparing with SO2 observation data from October to November 2000. Atmospheric dispersions of SO2 are calculated by using our software system that combines a regional atmospheric dynamic model and a particle random walk model. It was proved that the real-time prediction of our system has adequate precision. The importance of including the effect of wet deposition was also shown. The release amounts estimated from the comparison between the calculation result and the monitoring data are 20,000 - 50,000 ton/day, which is consistent to measured ones at the Miyake Island.