Snow forecast next week on Mount Fuji, at last

TOKYO - Japan’s Mount Fuji, snowless for the longest since records began 130 years ago, is expected to finally get its famous white cap back next week, a local forecaster said on Oct 31.

Snow on average begins forming on Japan’s highest mountain on Oct 2 and the latest it had been detected before 2024 was in 1955 and 2016, when it fell on Oct 26.

“Rain is likely to fall temporarily near Mount Fuji on Nov 6,” forecasting website tenki.jp, run by the Japan Weather Association, said on Oct 31.

“Cold air will move in and change from rain to snow near the summit,” it said. “The weather will gradually clear up, and the first snow on the mountain may be observed on the morning of the 7th.”

Another company Weather News also said on Oct 30 that “the first snowfall is likely to be pushed back to November”.

At Lake Kawaguchi, a favourite viewing spot for the volcano, French visitor Hugo Koide told AFP it was “quite shocking to see at this time of year there’s no snow.”

The 25-year-old, who used to visit the area in autumn in his childhood, said he remembered how Fuji “was always covered by snow.”

“I’m rocking up in T-shirt and shorts. It kind of doesn’t feel the same,” said Australian traveller Jason Le.

“I think that across the globe it is kind of affecting everybody. We’re from Australia and what you are seeing is it is getting hotter in the summer months and it’s getting colder earlier,” he told AFP.

In 2023, snow was first detected on Fuji on Oct 5.

Mr Yutaka Katsuta, a forecaster in the town of Kofu’s meteorological office, told AFP on Oct 28 climate change may play a role in delaying snowfall, with this year being the latest since comparative data became available in 1894.

“Temperatures were high this summer, and these high temperatures continued into September, deterring cold air (bringing snow),” Mr Katsuta told AFP.

Japan’s summer in 2024 was the joint hottest on record – equalling the level seen in 2023 – as extreme heatwaves fuelled by climate change engulfed many parts of the globe.

Warm weather has been affecting other snowy regions across the globe, with many ski resorts increasingly being forced to confront the realities of a warming climate.

In Japan, the city of Sapporo in the normally chilly northern island of Hokkaido, has begun discussing scaling down its famous snow festival due to a shortage. AFP