Images

View of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater, looking south. The floor of the crater was resurfaced yesterday (August 27) by lava flows erupting from a vent at the northeast edge of the crater (fuming area to the left).

Yesterday's lava flows in Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō erupted from a vent at the northeast edge of the crater and added a new layer to the crater floor. This photograph looks northeast across the relatively smooth crater floor toward the vent that erupted, which is a spatter cone that appears as a faintly visible mound in the fume in the background.

This photo is from within the crater, looking back at the USGS scientist who took the adjacent photo.

A large breakout from the lava tube on the north side of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō yesterday (August 27) formed a large channelized flow, but it did not last long. The activity died in the evening, the same day, and traveled only about 500 m (about 550 yards).

As magma rises toward Earth's surface, gases dissolved in the molten rock bubble out and escape through surface vents called fumaroles. HVO established sensors atop Mauna Loa in late 2005 to continuously monitor the concentration of carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide gases and fumarole temperature within Moku‘āweoweo, the summit caldera.

This map shows recent changes to Kīlauea's active East Rift Zone lava flow field. The area of the flow on August 5 is shown in pink, while widening and advancement of the flow as of August 26 is shown in red. The yellow lines show the active lava tube system. Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō lava flows erupted prior to June 27, 2014, are shown in gray.

Two of three lava flows that raced down the southwest slope of Mauna Loa on June 2, 1950, are shown here. As lava entered the ocean, steaming water marked its offshore course. A semicircular area of hot, turbulent water killed many fish that were seen drifting on currents or washing up on shore over the next few days. Photo courtesy of U.S. Air Force.

Scientists, civil authorities, and emergency managers from Chile and the U.S. met in California to discuss the challenges of effective volcanic hazard education, response planning, hazard mitigation, and risk reduction, as part of the second Bi-national Exchange program for Volcanic Risk Reduction in the Americas.

This volcanic-gas monitoring station installed at Mount St. Helens consists of weather monitoring equipment and sensors for measuring the concentrations of water vapor (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) in volcanic gas plumes.

Mount Hood Spectrograms for August 21, 2015.

View from the OR35 bridge over the White River looking downstream. Glistening areas are deposits from recent debris flows.

Sediment-laden White River 11 km downstream of the OR35 bridge. Heavy rains resulted in high-sediment loads within this river, which drains Mount Hood, Oregon.

The overflow of Halema‘uma‘u Crater on February 23, 1918. Photo by T.A. Jaggar from the HVO Record Book courtesy of Bishop Museum.

USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory geophysicist Ingrid Johanson measures gravity with a gravimeter on the slope of Mauna Loa with Mauna Kea visible in the background. USGS photo.

Dr. Seth Moran at USGS-Cascades Volcano Observatory

This map shows recent changes to Kīlauea's active East Rift Zone lava flow field. The area of the flow on July 23 is shown in pink, while widening and advancement of the flow as of August 5 is shown in red. The yellow lines show the active lava tube system. Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō lava flows erupted prior to June 27, 2014, are shown in gray.

This small-scale map shows Kīlauea's active East Rift Zone lava flow in relation to the eastern part of the Island of Hawai‘i. The area of the flow on July 23 is shown in pink, while widening and advancement of the flow as of August 5 is shown in red.

Volcanic ash deposit at base of Uwēkahuna Bluff below Jaggar Museum. Photo by T.A. Jaggar on July 29, 1913. Ash deposit buried by lava flow in 1919. Standing man is circled. From HVO Record Book courtesy of Bishop Museum.

The pit west of the Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater, shown here, is overhung on most sides and may continue to widen with time. The lava pond inside is relatively placid, appearing as a black surface, usually with a few tiny spattering areas along the edge.

High aerial view of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō, looking south-southwest. The current crater at Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō is about 280 m (~920 ft) long and 230 m (~755 ft) wide, with a depth of about 25 m (~82 ft). To the west of the crater is another pit 49 m (~161 ft) across that contains a small lava pond.

Lava flows are scattered across a broad area extending from about 3 to 8 km (2-5 mi) northeast of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō. The active flows start just above the horizontal mid-line of the photo, but cannot be picked out easily within the broader inactive flow field due to their distance away in this photo.