The USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO) has been publishing weekly “Volcano Watch” articles for over 30 years. Now, we are launching another weekly feature, the “Volcano Minute,” a brief audio update for radio stations and available online!
HVO’s weekly “Volcano Watch” articles are short and featured in many local print and online news outlets. The articles are a way to keep communities on the Island of Hawaiʻi informed about recent unrest or eruptive activity at active volcanoes in Hawaii, associated volcano-related hazards, or ongoing scientific research.
The “Volcano Minute” is meant to be a distilled audio version of the weekly “Volcano Watch” article, geared to Hawaii residents and visitors who wish to hear the latest happenings in Hawaiian volcanism. It will be no more than two minutes long and provide weekly information about eruptions, earthquakes, or ongoing volcano science in Hawaii.
Like “Volcano Watch,” the “Volcano Minute” will be available on the HVO website. When the weekly audio update is published, it will be featured in the News section of the website, and an archive of all the past “Volcano Minute” updates will be available on a separate webpage (https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo/volcano-minute). If you operate a local radio station and are interested in featuring the weekly HVO “Volcano Minute” audio update, email us at askHVO@usgs.gov, and we’ll add you to our weekly email distribution list.
Both the “Volcano Watch” and “Volcano Minute” are a small piece of the larger suite of products that HVO staff and our collaborators provide to communicate about volcanic activity in Hawaii. Communication is a key piece of the HVO mission, and we have various strategies for reaching our diverse audiences.
In addition to the “Volcano Watch” and “Volcano Minute,” you can subscribe to receive written timely updates via email about volcanic activity and earthquakes as they occur using the Volcano Notification Service at https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/vns/.
These notices include Updates, Information Statements, Status Reports, and Volcanic Activity Notices written by scientists at HVO. Some of them are scheduled (for example, Kīlauea Daily Updates that are published each morning and summarize the past 24 hours of activity) while others are written in response to changes in volcanic activity or earthquakes in Hawaii.
Volcano Notification Service messages are also available on the HVO website, along with photos, videos, and maps that provide a snapshot of what Hawaii’s volcanoes and recent eruptions look like, as well as their impacts. If you prefer to get information on social media, we also frequently update the USGSVolcanoes accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and X, with similar information and multimedia.
The USGS Publications Warehouse website (https://pubs.usgs.gov/) is another useful resource if you are interested in more detailed scientific summaries. This online repository includes various USGS publications, such as Fact Sheets, General Information Products, and Scientific Investigations Reports. HVO scientists also frequently publish articles in scientific journals but many of these publications require access fees.
If you prefer to review HVO’s volcano monitoring data directly, most of it is directly available in near real-time on the HVO website. Use the monitoring map at the top of the HVO home page (https://www.usgs.gov/observatories/hvo) to click on individual monitoring instruments to view plots of data over different timespans. Webpages summarizing Kīlauea and Mauna Loa monitoring are also provided at the links below, and links on the right side of those webpages provide access to other webpages summarizing Kīlauea and Mauna Loa monitoring datasets over the past week, month, year, and 5 years.
- https://www.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/science/monitoring-data-kilauea
- https://www.usgs.gov/volcanoes/mauna-loa/science/monitoring-data-mauna-loa
HVO provides this range of information, in different formats and on different timescales, to try reaching as wide of an audience as possible. Our primary audience is Island of Hawaiʻi and State of Hawaii residents, who can be directly impacted by volcanic activity and earthquakes here. However, because our volcanoes erupt so frequently, we often also capture the attention of national and international volcano enthusiasts, as well as fellow scientists.
We hope you’ve got a minute to listen to the new weekly “Volcano Minute” audio update, which will catch you up on the latest volcano or earthquake activity in Hawaii. If you have questions or ideas for future topics, please let us know at askHVO@usgs.gov.