Images

The high point of Mauna Loa, in the background at an elevation of about 13,679 ft, is actually just the highest point along the rim of the steep cliffs that surround Mauna Loa's summit caldera, Moku‘āweoweo, Dark-colored lava flows of recent vintage (1984) cover the floor of Moku‘āweoweo. View is looking southwest.

This edge of the cliff above Moku‘āweoweo, at an elevation of 13,661 feet, is only a few feet lower than Mauna Loa's high point (out of sight to the left). The cliff here is about 600 feet high. Mauna Kea, in the background to the right rises to an elevation of 13,796 feet, barely 100 feet higher the summit of Mauna Loa.

This view of Mauna Loa's 1940 vent cone, looking to the southwest, shows a fissure that bisected it during the 1984 eruption (crack on the right side of the cone). Pāhoehoe flows and spatter erupted from the 1984 fissure blanket the caldera floor northwest of the cone (foreground).

This aerial view of Mauna Loa's summit shows the cinder-cone and lava flows that were erupted in 1949. The crack extending down the left side of the cone is the northeast-southwest trending 1984 fissure that bisected the southwest flank of the cone during the initial phase of the eruption. Light-brown tephra erupted from the 1949 cone thins to the west.

USGS employees deploys a water conductivity/temperature/depth probe (AquaTroll) for a temporary study along the Madison River, Yellowstone.

A close-up of the swiftly moving lava stream, plunging into the lava lake.

A complex configuration has been in place deep within the vent cavity in Halema`uma`u crater. Lava upwells in the west portion of the vent floor (upper left of photograph), feeding the small, crusted, circular lava lake.

The western Kamoamoa fountain-fed lava flows advanced over 1997 lavas (dark flow in foreground) with 1965 and 1968 lavas buried by Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō cinder to the far left. Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō is in the distant background.

Looking northwest at the lava pond on the floor of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater. At the time of the photograph, the level of the lava pond was about 3 m (10 ft) below the floor of the crater.

An hour later, the lava had risen high enough to spill over the pond walls and expand across the crater floor.

After an intrusion on March 5, Pu‘u‘ō‘ō crater floor subsided for several hours. Hot incandescent crater walls were exposed as the floor dropped a total of 113 m (371 ft). Frequent rockfalls into the crater triggered red ash plumes. USGS photo taken by T. Orr on March 5, 2011, at 4:32 p.m.

In this close-up view of the lava lake in Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō, lava upwells at the west edge of the lake (bottom center of the photo) and flows toward the east (top of photo) where the mostly degassed lava sinks back down, presumably circulating back into the vent.

Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō continues to host a small lava lake at the bottom of the crater. Minor spattering and overturning of the lake surface was observed by field crews today.

This thermal image was taken from the south rim of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater, showing the lava lake within the crater. Hotter surfaces, such as the narrow zones between crustal plates, are shown by yellow and white colors. Cooler surfaces, such as the cooled lava around the lake, are shown by blue and black colors.

A small lava lake, confined by slightly elevated levees, is active at the bottom of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater. The lake is roughly the same size as a football field.

Lava reappeared in Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō crater on Saturday morning (March 26), covering the floor of the crater with a small lava lake.

Wes Thelen began his new job as HVO's Seismic Network Manager amidst a flurry of volcanic and seismic activity during Kīlauea Volcano's recent Kamoamoa fissure eruption, shown here on March 9, 2011.

Sunset Crater, a basaltic cinder cone in the San Francisco Volcanic Field, Arizona, erupted in 1085 A.D.

HVO staff and volunteers map run-up elevations and inundation distances of tsunami waves that reached the shores around Hawai‘i Island following the magnitude-9.0 earthquake in Japan.

An early morning view of the fountaining we encountered at the western fissure on Sunday, March 6, at 7:20 a.m. Particles were thrown up to 15 m (50 ft) high at this point and the intensity and height increased over the next two hours.

The channelized flow from the western vent complex advanced significantly downslope through forest within the Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park.