Families of victims of the 2014 Mount Ontake eruption have climbed the 3,067-meter mountain, which straddles Nagano and Gifu prefectures, ahead of the 10th anniversary of the eruption, which left 58 people dead and five missing, in September.
Thirteen people took part in Sunday's memorial climb. At the Kengamine peak, they observed a moment of silence at 11:52 a.m., the same time the eruption occurred on Sept. 27, 2014. They also laid flowers and made soap bubbles to mourn for the victims.
The memorial climb has been conducted every year since 2016, and Sunday's marked the ninth such event.
Junichi Horiguchi, 77, who lost his oldest son, then 37, sprinkled whisky from the summit. "My mind has been full of my son" for the past 10 years, said Hoiguchi, who is from the city of Akaiwa, Okayama Prefecture.
Tokiya Matsui, 27, who is from Kobe, hated the mountain after he lost his father, then 47, but he climbed it for the first time Sunday. His mind has changed over the past 10 years. "I came to think that I wanted to go to the place where my father died," Matsui said.
An entry ban had been in place for the ridge between the Otaki and Kengamine peaks since the eruption, but it was lifted in July last year after safety measures were taken, such as setting up shelters.
The large-scale search for the five missing, which involved the Nagano Prefectural Government and others, was discontinued in August 2015. The group of families has since continued search efforts on its own but has recently hired Mountainworks, a private company with expertise in mountain searches.