TOKYO: Snow has finally fallen on Mount Fuji, photographs shared by local authorities and residents showed on Wednesday (Nov 6), after the Japanese mountain’s longest-ever stint with bare slopes.
The national weather agency – which compares conditions in exactly the same location each year – has not yet announced a new record for the slowest formation of Mount Fuji’s famous snowcap, due to cloudy conditions near its monitoring station.
But photographs taken from different points around the active volcano, where the skies were clearer early on Wednesday, showed a covering of snow on its peak.
“These are photos of Mount Fuji, seen from the city hall this morning. We could see a thin layer of snow cover near the summit,” said a post on the official X account of Fuji City, in Japan’s central Shizuoka region.
Many others in the area also posted their own photographs of snow on the country’s highest mountain.
“Finally, the first snow cover! Mount Fuji looks good with snow,” said a post from a nursing home, also in Fuji City.
Mount Fuji’s snowcap begins forming on Oct 2 on average, and last year snow was first detected by government meteorologists stationed in Kofu City on Oct 5.
That makes this year the latest arrival of snow since comparative data became available in 1894, beating the previous record of Oct 26 – seen twice, in 1955 and 2016.
