The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology has lowered the alert level of Taal Volcano from three to two due to the “decreased unrest.”
In its latest bulletin, Phivolcs said that this was due to the volcano’s condition in the past three weeks which had been characterized by less frequent volcanic earthquake activity, stabilizing ground deformation of the Taal Caldera and Taal Volcano Island edifices, and weak steam or gas emissions at its main crater.
Although State volcanologists have lowered Taal’s alert level, Phivolcs warned that “it should not be interpreted that its unrest has ceased or that the threat of its eruption has disappeared.”
“Should an uptrend or pronounced change in monitored parameters forewarn a potential eruption, the alert level may be raised back to Alert Level 3,” Phivolcs said.
“Should there be a persistent downtrend in monitored parameters after a sufficient observation period, the alert level will be further lowered to Alert Level 1,” it added.
Taal erupted last Jan. 12 and was put under Alert Level 4. Two weeks later, the alert level was lowered to three as it simmered down. (Joseph Pedrajas)