Images

Puna residents reported to HVO geologists the recent appearance of ground cracks on a couple of roads in and around Leilani Estates. No steaming or heat were observed to originate from the cracks, and the cracks are currently still small (no more than several inches across).

As of this afternoon (May 1), the eruption at the summit of Kīlauea has apparently not been affected by the collapse of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō or intrusion of magma along the volcano's Lower East Rift Zone.

Within hours of the Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater floor collapse, HVO's monitoring instruments recorded increased seismicity and ground deformation along Kīlauea Volcano's East Rift Zone (ERZ) that continued through the night. These signals indicated an intrusion of magma from the Middle ERZ toward the Lower ERZ, extending from Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō to at least Highway 130.

This map shows recent changes to Kīlauea's East Rift Zone lava flow field and Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō cone. The 61g flow field, as of April 13, 2018, is shown in pink. The crack that formed on the west side of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō on April 30th, 2018, during or immediately after the crater floor collapse is shown as a solid black line.

Just before 10:00 a.m. today (Monday, April 30), a break in the weather allowed HVO's webcam to capture this image of the lava lake within Halema‘uma‘u at the summit of Kīlauea. Following multiple overflows of the lava lake last week, the lake level dropped over the weekend in concert with the switch to summit deflation.

Night view of Kīlauea Volcano's summit lava lake from April 24, 2018, while lava from the lake overflow was spreading westward (to the right in the picture) from the Overlook Vent. USGS photo from the Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Jaggar Overlook by M. Patrick.

Vigorous overflows from Kīlauea's summit lava lake covered a large portion of the floor of Halema‘uma‘u this morning. In this video, the view starts from the north and heads south, showing the north and east sides of Halema‘uma‘u crater.

Beginning around midnight on Saturday, April 21, Kīlauea Volcano's summit lava lake rose high enough that lava briefly spilled onto the floor of Halema‘uma‘u. Since then, additional overflows occurred in four pulses on April 22-23. The largest one occurred during the fourth pulse, which started at 6:30 a.m.

Overflows from the perched lava pond within west pit, a small crater adjacent to the main Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater on Kīlauea Volcano's East Rift Zone, continue to build up the levees around the pond. The rising level of the perched lava pond during the past month is a sign of the increasing pressure within the magma system beneath Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō.

This time-lapse image sequence taken by a time-lapse camera on the rim of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō's west pit, spans March 20 to April 18. The sequence, of approximately one image per day, shows the growth of the lava pond within the west pit as it developed into a perched lava pond. This sequence is looped 4 times.

A brief break in the rain allowed for some clear views of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō on Kīlauea Volcano's East Rift Zone. Since mid-March, Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō tiltmeters have been recording inflation, and uplift of the crater floor is visible in HVO webcams.

An HVO geologist observes the perched lava pond within the west pit of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō.

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Summit deflation began this morning, and the lake level has dropped slightly. This morning the lake was about 14 m (46 ft) below the Overlook crater rim, having dropped roughly 4 m (13 ft) since yesterday morning. In this photo, an HVO geologist checks on a time-lapse camera on the rim of Halema‘uma‘u Crater.

Over the past month, HVO monitoring instruments have recorded a sharp inflationary trend at Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō (see https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/monitoring_deformation.html, scroll to bottom of page).

Over the past few days, Kīlauea Volcano's summit lava lake in Halema‘uma‘u has steadily risen as summit inflation continues. Today, Sunday, April 15, the lake surface was just 14 m (46 ft) below the Overlook crater rim. Spattering has also been active, with this photo showing a large spattering site in the southeast portion of the lake.

This light gray block of rock (backpack for scale) is part of the approximately 830-year-old explosion deposit on the northwest rim of Moku‘āweoweo, the summit caldera of Mauna Loa. USGS photo by F.A. Trusdell.

This satellite image was captured on Thursday, April 12, by the Landsat 8 satellite. Although this is a false-color image, the color map has been chosen to mimic what the human eye would expect to see. Bright red pixels depict areas of high temperatures and show active lava. White areas are clouds.

Most of the lava flow (dark black) produced by the April 1868 Mauna Loa eruption can be seen in this aerial photo on the west (left) side of the prominent fault scarp, known informally as the Kahuku pali (formal names are Pali o Mamalu for the upper half and Pali‘okūlani for the lower half of the scarp).

Video: Clear skies and sunshine provided a spectacular view of Kīlauea Volcano's summit lava lake this morning. Spattering on the north side and center of the lake surface—a departure from its more common location on the southeast side of the lake—occasionally happens when the surface flow direction reverses.

[Left] This cross-section through the south part of the Island of Hawai'i illustrates the hypocenter of the 1868 great Kaʻū earthquake (red star), located on the décollement (bold black line) between Mauna Loa (brown) and the ancient ocean floor (tan). Earth's lithospheric mantle and the ocean are represented in green and blue, respectively.