Around the globe in Japan, Kirishima, a volcano on the southern island of Kyushu, has started erupting vigorously. I haven't been able to find many reports, but the Tokyo VAAC issued an ash warning for Kirishima to elevations up to ~7.6 km / 25,000 feet and the Kirishima webcam (there are three, but only one that is still working. UPDATE: you can try this link to all of the JMA webcams, but it is in Japanese. In the menu on the right, Kirishima is the 7th from the bottom of the list) seems to be showing significant glowing material coming from the summit area. This activity looks to be phreatomagmatic explosions throwing material from the crater and/or pyroclastic flows and reports indicate bombs being thrown upwards of 2 km (Japanese) from the vent. Judging from some of the webcam images (see below) captured by members of the Eruptions Tuff Team, the eruption is explosive with what looks like some plumes of incandescent material reaching a few hundred meters, producing the larger ash plume that caused the VAAC warning. Based on local news reports, ash has fallen on Nichinan and Miyazaki and parts of the highways (Japanese) on Kyushu have been blocked due to the current activity. Japanese officials have placed the area around the volcano on alert status 3.
UPDATE: Here is a longer video about the eruption both from the ground and helicopter along with satellite radar and ash fall images, again with Japanese commentary. The text with the video mentions some flight cancellations due to the ash along with closed roads and significant ashfall in parts of the Miyazaki Prefecture. {special thanks to Kirby for the link}.
