Thanks to the Italian Space Agency for taking a radar satellite image of Kilauea about once a week:
USGS: “May 5 and June 18 at about 6:00 a.m.[…]The last five images in the sequence, from May 29-June 18, show the development of several cracks outside Halema‘uma‘u (also seen in recent UAS footage of the crater) and inward slumping of a large portion of the western, southwestern, and northern crater rim. Much of this motion appears to be coincident with the small explosions from the summit that have taken place on a near daily basis over the past 3 weeks.” (Full-sized)Yes, HVO and the Jaggar Museum have evacuated, and artwork has been moved to safety.
About timestamp 0:30 in June 13 overflight video, Madame Pele’s profile appears in the partly-cooled lava. Mahalo to Tutu Pele, to Mick Kalber for his tireless aerial videography, and to my mother for pointing her out to me. [Although it sounds like Mick took the day off, and I should thank Mick’s co-photographer lavajavadude.]Respect.
Now, how do I transition from that back to the science side of Kilauea?
Today’s Eruption Summary
Last night and today, Fissure 8’s fountains have rebounded to 200 feet, but the cinder/spatter cone they’ve built is so tall they’re just peeking out:
USGS: “The Fissure 8 viewed from the north at 7:50 AM. The cone is roughly 50 m (165 ft) high at is peak, and a plume of sulfur dioxide and other volcanic gases rises as an orange tinge from the erupting lava fountains (hidden within the cone). Lava is still flowing out of the vent unabated as a full channel. To the left of the cone, a standing wave of lava can be seen in the channel.” (Full-sized)
Fissures 16 and 17 continue to “ooze,” to borrow the USGS’ technical term.
Fissure 8’s lava river remains fast, wide and healthy. It stays incandescent red rather than skimmed over for many miles, which shows just how hot and voluminous it is (26,000 gallons/second). It’s entering the ocean along a dramatically broad front (second half of video clip):
Today’s summit explosion (energy equivalent of M5.3, like clockwork) occurred at 3:19am HST, with an ash plume to 6,000 feet. Again, there were lots of earthquakes in the hours leading up to it, then they dropped off, and now they’re ramping back up to the next explosion. This pattern must be getting pretty old for the nearby residents of Volcano.
Wow. Photo: Elizabeth Kekedi – CD Thurs, 6/14 6AM HVO reports ash explosion early this morning at the Kilauea Summit. Beware of ash fallout throughout Kau. Community meeting on vog/ash, today 5:30 p.m. @ Ocean View Community Center #kilauea#KilaueaVolcano#punapic.twitter.com/U5fF00PF0w
Lower East Rift Zone: Fissure 8 continues to build its oblong cinder and spatter cone. Overnight fountain heights were 130-140 ft, up to 53m (174ft) by the afternoon. Fissures 16 and 18 continue weak activity.
USGS: “Fissure 8 fountains to heights of 130-140 ft. The lava spatter chills and the fragments are building a cone on the downwind side, now nearly as tall as the fountain itself.” (Full-sized)
Fissure 8’s lava flow had a “towering” steam plume at its ocean entry point this morning. Areas of offshore upwelling have become more dispersed.
The daily summit explosion was at 3:39am, equivalent to M5.4 earthquake, with an ash plume 7-8K feet (NWS radar has been repaired). Slumping and subsidence continue at Halema’uma’u, and SO2 emissions remain about half pre-event levels.
Before and After: Changes at Halema’uma’u
Here’s a good view of Halema’uma’u taken at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, April 19, 2018 by Christoph Strässler (Creative Commons):
Gorgeous photo of Halema’uma’u Crater and its lava lake, April 19, 2018 by Christoph Strässler (Creative Commons). See his photo album for more images from this visit.
Compare with this animation from HVO webcam June 1-10, or the new drone footage later in this post.
USGS: “A series of wide-angle webcam images, captured by a camera in HVO’s observation tower between June 1 and June 10, 2018, show ongoing subsidence around Halema‘uma‘u at the summit of Kīlauea in this animated GIF.” (Full-sized)
Today’s Kilauea news daily digest is full of science, science, science! the usual slew of incredible pictures. Also, some glimmers of hope for lava evacuees, although as usual bureaucracy moves at the speed of of dirt.
Summit: Today’s “Type A” explosion occurred at 1:52am. It produced almost no ash this time, although there’s still light ash and SO2 coming out of the crater from time to time. The view of the continued slumping/subsidence of Halema’uma’u crater is impressive (also see Jun 9 video on Twitter):
USGS: “Events at the summit of Kīlauea over the past few weeks have dramatically reshaped Halema‘uma‘u, shown here in this aerial view, which looks west across the crater. The obvious flat surface (photo center) is the former Halema‘uma‘u crater floor, which has subsided at least 100 m (about 300 ft) during the past couple weeks. Ground cracks circumferential to the crater rim can be seen cutting across the parking lot (left) for the former Halema‘uma‘u visitor overlook (closed since 2008). The deepest part of Halema‘uma‘u (foreground) is now about 300 m (1,000 ft) below the crater rim. The Halema‘uma‘u crater rim and walls continue to slump inward and downward with ongoing subsidence at Kīlauea’s summit.” (Full-sized)
Fissure 8’s cluster of vents is erupting up to 160ft today. With the cinder cone that’s built up around them, they’re mostly hidden. It’s entering the ocean today along a broad front. Fissure 16/18 are spattering weakly; this is the “weak activity” reported for the past few days. Apart from that, the Lower East Rift Zone is quiet, although other fissures are still releasing gasses.
Fissure 8 on #Kilauea's Lower East Rift Zone #LERZ – a nursery of volcanic bombs and spatter. Expanding volcanic gases rip the clots of lava apart as they rise through the air, forming ejecta of myriad shape and size. Photos taken on June 11. pic.twitter.com/E9iYbD9Zp8
The good news is, Fissure 8’s lava flow has built up such high, broad banks that unless it overflows them, it probably won’t cover many more homes or cut off new areas. The bad news is, the lava river could still break its levees, and there’s no guarantee other fissures won’t reactivate. USGS field crews reported a “non-erupting crack” in the Lower East Rift Zone with “temperatures as high as 430°C (806°F).”
Note, however, high temps may not indicate imminent changes. USGS clarified on Facebook: “This was at Fissure 10, which has long displayed high temperatures (fortunately, no SO2 was detected). It does not mean an eruption there is imminent, but rather it is a place where various superheated gases are escaping.” Similarly, there’s been high temps at the cracks across Highway 130, which have steamed but so far not erupted at all.
Somewhat abbreviated Daily Digest today because I started late, and then took forever transcribing 11AM conference call. But the stunning pictures keep coming…
Once again the USGS media conference call at 11AM is full of so much juicy info I’ve moved it to a separate post rather than make my daily digest 10 pages long.
BigIslandVideo hasn’t put their edited/abridged version up, which they usually enhance with recent video footage. But they cut a lot of the Q&A anyway.
Below are my paraphrase/notes on the full, unabridged conference call (I skipped a non-geology questions where answer is “Agency X handles that; ask them.”]
I didn’t realize I’d missed one of Steve Brantley’s excellent 10-minute slideshow presentations at the weekly Puna Community Meetings. This one took place on Tuesday, June 12 at Pahoa High School.
I learn something from every one of these talks, which sum up Kilauea eruption activity of the past week in a way that’s easy for the general public to understand without talking down to them.
Video of meeting is archived here. Steve’s presentation starts at timestamp 42:10. Where possible, I’ll be including images in my transcript which match his slides.
(Steve Brantley is a USGS geologist, deputy-scientist-in-charge of Hawaiian Volcano Observatory.)
Transcript
Hello everybody. Thank you for coming out again and thank you for your perseverance. I’ll show a couple slides of what’s been happening down in this part of the neighborhood and end with some slides of the summit area, which continues to change very dramatically.
So this is the overview slide I’ve showed for the past few times. It gives you the overall picture. It’s an image, cartoon, from the summit area all the way out to the eastern tip of the island. The summit area here [under “Kilauea Caldera” label], eastern tip [down by “Kapoho Crater”], with a cross section showing you the general picture of the magma reservoir system from the summit of the volcano down through the East Rift Zone and into the Lower East Rift Zone.
At a 3PM press conference, Jim Kauahikaua (USGS geophysicist) described in detail the subsidence at Halema’uma’u. He also talks about a patch of “upwelling” where lava has entered ocean at Kapoho and seems to be traveling along ocean floor, heating water above it.
Fissure8’s “three closely space fountains” are starting to climb down, reported at 115-130 feet last night, and “fluctuating heights from below the 115 ft high spatter cone around it up to 180 feet” this afternoon. But its lava flow is still full to its banks, entering the ocean in Kapoho with minor steam explosions. “Weak lava activity” was spotted at fissure 16/18 last night.
USGS: “The three closely spaced lava fountains at fissure 8 reached maximum heights of 115-130 feet overnight. Lava fragments falling from the fountains are building a cinder-and-spatter cone around the erupting vent, with the bulk of the fragments falling on the downwind side of the cone. Fissure 8 continues to feed a channelized lava flow that reaches the ocean at Kapoho.” (Full-sized)
Last night, Kilauea’s summit hiccuped: there was a small explosion at 12:46am, after which, seismicity did not drop off until after another, larger explosion at 4:43am like the ones we’ve seen lately (registered as M5.4).
USGS: “A series of wide-angle webcam images, captured by a camera in HVO’s observation tower between June 1 and June 10, 2018, show ongoing subsidence around Halema‘uma‘u at the summit of Kīlauea in this animated GIF.” (Full-sized)
Since Saturday, Fissure 8’s gas emissions have been much higher than last week, whereas summit SO2 is half what it was before the current eruption. (I’m not sure why HVO’s Kilauea alerts report “volcanic gasses” for one and only SO2 for the other.)
(The “Lava Livestream” house is still safe, if marooned, near white mast):
USGS: “Aerial view of the fissure 8 lava channel on Kīlauea Volcano’s lower East Rift Zone in the vicinity of the Kapoho cone, with fissure 8 fountains visible in the distance (upper left). Helicopter overflights of the eruption site are routinely scheduled to check for any new outbreaks of lava and to collect GPS data on the active flow—information that’s needed to make the flow field maps that are posted on HVO’s website” (Full-sized)
Here’s a double feature from Mick Kalber’s daily overflights— below is his June 11 lava video, but I missed his June 10 flyover vid and lava update notes.
Below the cut: more great images, overflight vids, and some interesting USGS answers to questions on social media.
Fissure 8’s eight-mile lava river and the summit’s daily explosion have followed their usual pattern of the past two weeks. However, volcanic gas emissions at the Lower East Rift Zone doubled on Saturday compared to the past week, while SO2 emissions from Halema’uma’u are about half what they were before this current eruption started.
USGS: “The fissure 8 cone and lava fountaining viewed at 8PM HST on June 9 from a location on Kupono Street. The incandescence to the left is lava in the active channel.” BELOW: June 10 Hawaii Fire Department Overflight, ocean entry plume in far distance.
Are those two facts linked? I dunno. I’ll be interested to hear if/when lava samples collected from the Fissure 8 flow start to show signs they came down from the summit instead of Pu’u O’o.
USGS: “The northern rim of Halema’uma’u Crater at Kilauea’s summit on June 9, from the noon helicopter overflight. The floor of the Kilauea Caldera is showing prominent cracking from the ongoing subsidence, and the steaming cracks in the background have been observed for several days now.”
Before-and-After Halema’uma’u 2017 vs 2018
I found a July 2017 screencap from HVO’s panorama webcam, so here’s an animation fading from it to today’s view. Check out the full-sized animation; you can really see how much Halema’uma’u has enlarged.
Be warned, there’s some sad news, especially in the social media section at the end. This is a natural disaster, and it’s hard, even if it provides some amazing visuals and fascinating science as compensation. But they can’t make up for what’s lost.
I came across this interesting paper on the last lava flow to threaten Lower Puna, just 3-4 years ago. It brings home just how remarkable the current eruption is.
Poland’s paper says that the Pu’u O’o lava flow (Episode 61e) that started June 27, 2014 was the longest at Kilauea in the past 500 years.* It eventually reached a length of ~20 km (12.43 miles), butit took until March 2015 to get there. Its average rate of speed was 0-500 meters a day.
By contrast, Fissure 8’s current flow started on May 26, 2018, and covered 13 km (8 miles) to the ocean by the evening of June 3 (eight days). At times it exceeded 500 meters per hour.
This explains a lot.
I wondered why some residents of the Kapoho area said their evacuation orders came with “no warning,” or they didn’t bother to evacuate their belongings, or they didn’t think the lava would reach their house, even though the eruption had started a month before, and lava had been moving their way for a week.
But they’re used to the Pu’u O’o eruption of the past 35 years, which took years and years to reach and cover the community of Kalapana. The current eruption is covering as much ground in a week as Pu’u O’o took months to cover. And Pu’u O’o was traveling farther than any eruption in 500 years.
No wonder people were caught flat-footed!
Below: I created an animation of 3 HVO/USGS maps to show Pu’u O’o vs current Lower East Rift Zone lava flows.
Maps used to create this animation:
USGS April 30 map of Pu’u O’o active lava flow (pink, Episode 61g, May 24, 2016-Apr 30, 2018) and older Pu’u O’o flows (gray, Jan 3, 1983-Apr 30, 2018)
USGS May 2 map showing magma was moving into Lower East Rift Zone (inferred by earthquakes); Pu’u O’o lava flows of past 35 years shown in pale pink, episode 61g in dark pink. The 2014-2015 (episode 61e) flow is the light Y-shaped area extending to the northeast. (Sorry, I don’t have acreage numbers for episode 61g, or for that matter final totals for the Pu’u O’o lava flows.)
USGS June 10 map of active lava flows in Puna (Lower East Rift Zone) since May 3, 2018, with current flows in pink and historical flows (including the 2014 Pu’u O’o mentioned in that paper) in purple.
In short, the current 2018 eruption is hotter, faster, and covering so much ground that it’s surprising even to geologists, let alone residents. This is not the kind of volcanic eruption they’re used to.
*(Pu’u O’o’s 35-year eruption was exceeded by the 60-year Ailā‘au eruption that created the Thurston Lava Tube in the 1400s. After which, Kilauea caldera collapsed, and there were 300 years of explosive eruptions before Kilauea reverted to effusive (lava) eruptions. But don’t panic: we’re nowhere near 60 years of continuous lava flows even now. Also, two weeks ago the USGS said that only about 2% of the volume of magma in Kilauea’s magma chamber has erupted since May 3, and it’s still being resupplied from below.)
