Tag: Mauna Loa
Video: Kilauea Eruption’s Spectacular Return
After giving the world a lovely early midwinter gift with the first eruption of Mauna Loa in 38 years, Madam Pele took the holidays off. Kilauea’s summit eruption paused on December 9th, possibly due to the relief of stress as its neighbor’s reservoir emptied.* Mauna Loa’s display ended on the 13th, and both volcanoes slumbered peacefully through the new year.
Pele returned to Kilauea with a spectacular lava show on January 5th. And I’ve got the videos all nicely arranged for you.
Mauna Loa Erupts! What’s Next?
After a long period of unrest, Mauna Loa volcano began erupting near midnight on November 27th. Is this eruption a big frigging deal? Is it going to destroy major Hawaiian cities? How did we get here? Let’s delve!
First, you’ve gotta watch the first moments of the eruption though the USGS thermal camera at the summit. Watching a fissure split Moku’āweoweo caldera and fresh lava spill across the caldera floor is absolutely riveting:
Isn’t that gorgeous? I was mesmerized in the wee hours of the morning, refreshing the summit webcams and watching the eruption evolve. There’s something incredibly beautiful about fresh lava fountaining and flowing where it has absolutely zero chance of seriously ruining anyone’s day.
After resurfacing most of the caldera floor (which is a lot- the floor is nearly 15km² in area!), lava flows overtopped the crater rim to the southwest on the morning of November 28th. You could see lava from the coast! (more…)
The Year in Volcanoes at Rosetta Stones
2021 was an excellent year for eruptions that were fascinating to watch and not terribly dangerous to humans! Let’s look back on the eruptions we covered, and see where they are now, and what might be in store for 2022.
Kilauea, United States
Tūtū Pele has celebrated the last couple of New Years with sweet summit eruptions. From late December 2021 through most of May of 2021, we were treated to a spectacular end to the water lake in the crater and entertained by the dancing islands of the new lava lake. Pele took the summer off before abruptly returning on September 29th. She’s been putting on a crater lava show ever since, with just a few breaks, including a pause over Christmas. By the new year, she was back in action and put on a lovely show over the holiday.
Since Pelee’s only taken one year off since the 1980s, I’m expecting this year to include some gorgeous lava action from her current home. And stay tuned to see if she does any remodeling at Mauna Loa!
Geldingadalir (Fagradalsfjall), Iceland (more…)
A Must-Have Book for Lava Loving Kids: What’s So Hot About Volcanoes?
Having enjoyed Wendell A. Duffield’s Chasing Lava immensely, I was beyond delighted to discover that Wendell had written a book for younger people. I couldn’t order it fast enough.
What’s So Hot About Volcanoes is a fantastic choice for anyone looking for a book about volcanoes for older kids and tweens, or even adults who want an authoritative but not too technical introduction to how volcanoes work. Younger readers should be able to handle it, too, with assistance from older kids and adults. And it’s got a hook absolutely no one can resist: what happened to Wendell when he was standing on a fresh Kilauea lava field and the seismologist at Hawaiian Volcano Observatory told him the pattern of seismicity right underneath him suggested he should probably run away immediately!
Chasing Lava: A Fun and Fascinating Memoir of Hawaiian Volcanology
If you’re looking for a light, breezy, but informative book about volcanoes from a genuine volcanologist, I’ve got it right here for you. Chasing Lava: A Geologist’s Adventures at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory by Wendell Duffield is a delightful memoir of his years working at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. There’s a wonderful sense of adventure infusing the whole book, and he gets us up close and personal with Madame Pele’s handiwork.
Newly-hatched USGS geologist Wendell, his wife Anne, and their pets were stationed on the Big Island from 1969-1972. He worked on Kilauea Volcano at a time when the theory of plate tectonics was still brand new, our instruments were still bulky and somewhat primative, and volcanoes were much less understood than they are now.