All elementary and junior high school students will have to carry gas masks to school when they return to volcanic Miyake Island in February -- 4 1/2 years after being evacuated, the island's education board said Saturday.
The volcano on the island continues to belch toxic sulfur dioxide.
Members of the education board told families planning to return to the island in a meeting at the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building in Shinjuku Ward that about 60 elementary and 30 junior high school students are expected to attend classes on the island.
The municipal authority will employ four buses to take the students to and from school, and will provide the schools with equipment to remove sulfur dioxide from the air.
An elementary school and a junior high school on the island plan to resume classes in April after the municipal government's evacuation order to all the islanders is lifted in February.
A small eruption was observed Tuesday, the first since Nov. 24, 2002, but the local government said the incident will not affect its plan to lift the order.
More than 3,000 residents left the island, 180 km south of Tokyo, after an evacuation order was issued in September 2000 following volcanic eruptions. As of the beginning of July, 3,242 people in 1,672 households who used to live on the island currently reside in 18 prefectures.