Snow Finally Falls on Mount Fuji

Mount Fuji, Japan's highest mountain, had been bare until two days ago. On November 6, the latest date in the last 130 years (records began in 1894), the first flakes of the season finally fell on its legendary summit, which crowns the most sacred symbol of the Japanese nation. Snow after summer usually arrives on October 2, so Wednesday's heavy precipitation ended what was already seen as a national drama. The iconic image of the mountain is once again white at its top.

"It's the first time in November that we haven't seen snow on Mount Fuji, and it makes us feel very strange," says Takefumi Sakaki, an official from the city of Fujiyoshida, with 53,000 inhabitants and located at the foot of this volcano, which remains active, though with little risk: the last eruption was in 1707, more than three centuries ago.

The year 2024 breaks the previous record, reported in 1995 and 2016, when the first snow arrived on October 26. Last year, snow whitened the peak on October 5, but most of the frozen water disappeared by early November due to high temperatures.

Situated at 3,776 meters high, the summit of Mount Fuji is almost always covered in snow, but in July and August, climbers and hikers are allowed access. Japanese meteorologists, who do not consider there to be snow on the summit until it becomes firm, point to climate change as the cause of the snowfall delay.

"The temperature in October at the summit of Mount Fuji was warmer than usual," stated the national meteorological agency JMA. If 2023 was the hottest year in Japan's history, 2024 might even surpass the records, with September days reaching over 35 degrees.

Snow has helped confer Mount Fuji its spiritual, political, and cultural aura throughout Japan's history. For Shinto and Buddhist traditions, the mountain evoked immortality; for the shoguns, the military leaders of the Edo period (between the 17th and 19th centuries), it reminded them of the country's stability; the emperors of the first half of the 20th century turned it into a symbol of nationalism and Japanese superiority over its rivals, and after World War II, it served to restore the country's damaged honor. Katsushika Hokusai, the great Japanese painter and printmaker, created the most recognized paintings of this mountain, '36 Views of Mount Fuji', among which is the famous 'Under the Wave off Kanagawa', always with snow on the summit.

The views of Mount Fuji from the cities of Fuji or Fujiyoshida are one of Japan's typical postcards, but on cloudless days, the mountain can be seen from the capital, Tokyo, which is a hundred kilometers from the volcano.