Mayon Erupts and Rises to Alert Level 3: More Than 2,000 People Leave the Danger Zone

Mayon, the near-perfect cone that towers over Albay province in the Philippines, entered a more dangerous phase this week. At 11:53 a.m. local time on Friday, October 30, a moderately explosive eruption sent a dense ash plume 3,000 metres (9,843 feet) above the summit crater, and the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) raised the volcano from Alert Level 2 to Alert Level 3.

PHIVOLCS describes the change in plain terms: Alert Level 3 means an increased tendency toward a hazardous eruption. The agency calls the October 30 activity a new phase of magmatic eruption within Mayon's ongoing episode, with increased chances of lava flows and hazardous pyroclastic density currents — the fast-moving clouds of hot gas, ash and rock known locally as uson — affecting the upper to middle slopes in the immediate days to weeks.

Moderate winds carried the plume west-southwest, and PHIVOLCS expected ashfall in Daraga, Guinobatan, Camalig and adjacent municipalities in Albay. The ash hazard outlasted the eruption itself: the Tokyo Volcanic Ash Advisory Center, in advisory 2026/813 issued at 8:00 p.m. on October 30, said satellite imagery from Himawari-9 was still detecting volcanic ash at 7:20 p.m., with the cloud extending from the surface to flight level 180 — about 5.5 kilometres — and moving south at 20 knots, forecast to reach flight level 190 by the early hours of October 31.

That is why the warnings extend beyond the slopes. PHIVOLCS said civil aviation authorities must advise pilots to avoid flying close to the summit, because volcanic ash can endanger aircraft, and it urged increased vigilance along channels draining the volcano for pyroclastic currents, lahars and sediment-laden streamflows, especially if heavy rain follows.

The eruption did not arrive unannounced. Volcanic earthquakes climbed through the week — 4 in the October 28 monitoring period, 35 in the October 29 period and 101 in the October 30 period, the last including 18 volcanic tremors lasting between one and eight minutes. Ground-deformation measurements showed continued inflation of the volcano's edifice, with short-term deflation on its northeastern sector, and crater glow remained visible to the naked eye.

Gas told a more complicated story, which is why agencies read it alongside everything else: sulfur dioxide flux measured 1,413 tonnes per day on October 29, down from 3,360 tonnes per day on October 28. Before the blast, moderate emissions had produced a plume only about 100 metres above the crater. PHIVOLCS stresses that no single number decides the alert level — seismicity, deformation, gas and direct observation are assessed together.

PHIVOLCS recommended evacuation of the six-kilometre (3.7-mile) Permanent Danger Zone, and Albay moved the same afternoon. The Albay Public Safety and Emergency Management Office's 5 p.m. report on October 30 counted 746 families, or 2,041 people, already in evacuation centres: 531 families from Tabaco City, 205 from Camalig and 10 from Barangay Baligang in Ligao City. Malilipot, Legazpi City, Sto. Domingo, Daraga and Guinobatan were monitoring conditions on standby for possible evacuation.

The province's health office raised its own alert from Code White to Code Blue, mobilising additional resources, round-the-clock health emergency operations and standby response teams, and 22,000 surgical masks were distributed to health facilities and local governments against ashfall. The volcano answered overnight with a reminder that the story is live: at 5:17 a.m. on Saturday, October 31, Mayon emitted ash again, about 200 metres above the crater, drifting west-southwest — far smaller than Friday's plume, but enough to keep Alert Level 3 firmly in place. PHIVOLCS' latest monitoring counted 15 volcanic earthquakes and 30 rockfall events, crater glow still observed, and sulfur dioxide at 988 tonnes per day.

Mayon's current eruptive episode has been running since January 6, 2026, through lava-dome growth and collapse, lava flows and minor Strombolian activity — October 30 was an escalation inside that episode, not its beginning. What happens next is genuinely open: PHIVOLCS' Level 3 framing covers days to weeks, and the difference between a one-off blast and a sustained hazardous eruption will show first in the seismic counts, the deformation trend and the crater itself.

WorldEye's volcano webcams collect live views of active craters around the world, the same kind of direct observation volcanologists pair with their instrument networks — and our coverage of Kilauea's shifting episode 56 window shows the other way a volcano keeps the world waiting. For anyone in Albay, though, the instruction is not to watch: it is to stay out of the Permanent Danger Zone and follow PHIVOLCS and local evacuation orders.