Volcano Lightning Electrifies Japan Eruption

National Geographic, Jan 28, 2011

Electric Tentacle From Kirishima (Photograph from Takaharu/Reuters)

A "tentacle" of lightning stretches over Japan in a long-exposure picture taken Thursday of the ash plume rising from Shinmoedake peak, one of the calderas of the Kirishima volcano complex. Shinmoedake began erupting Wednesday, coating nearby villages and farms with ash and prompting authorities to ask for voluntary evacuations within a 1.2-mile (2-kilometer) radius.

Volcanic lightning is still a mystery, though it may be that electrically charged silica—part of magma—interacts with the atmosphere when it flies out of a volcano, Steve McNutt of the Alaska Volcano Observatory told National Geographic News in February 2010.

Kirishima is a grouping of about 20 volcanic peaks on the southern Japanese island of Kyushu (map). The site featured in the 1967 James Bond film You Only Live Twice, serving as the secret base of the main villain, Ernst Stavro Blofeld.

Although the complex is often active, Wednesday's eruption is the strongest recorded atKirishima since 1959, ABC News reports.

(Also see pictures of volcanic lightning during a recent eruption of an Iceland volcano.)

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