Officials with the U.S. Geological Survey confirmed Wednesday that an eruption has begun in Kilauea volcano’s Halemaumau crater at the volcano’s summit. Webcam footage of the crater showed lava fountains covering the floor of the crater and billowing clouds of volcanic gas rising into the air.

Kilauea is the world’s most active volcanic mass located on the Big island of Hawaii. It is an active shield volcano, a volcano that experiences near-continuous eruptive activity over extremely long periods of time. The last time the volcano erupted was December 20, 2020. 

The eruption is thankfully not in an area with homes and is completely contained within the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. The USGS scientist in charge of the Hawaii Volcano Observatory stated that, “All signs indicate that it will stay within the crater”, and “We’re not seeing any indications that lava is moving into the lower part of the east rift zone where people live. Currently all the activity is within the park.” Also, officials said there has been increased earthquake activity and ground swelling detected causing alert level to be raised to warning and changed the aviation code to red.

The type of eruption that happened this past Wednesday is said to possibly continue to occur for years. Hawaii Volcanoes National Park spokesperson Jessa Ferracane said, “We do know that one thing that happens is that the magma keeps coming in to Kilauea at a pretty constant rate and so it’s either filling the inside of the volcano and repressurize it or it’s coming out to the surface.”

Historically, Kilauea had caused a lot of damage to the island during a previous eruption. During an eruption in 2018, 700 homes were destroyed displacing many residents. Over four months within 2018 Kilauea expelled “enough lava to fill 320,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools” according to Associated Press News Agency Company. This buried an area more than half the size of Manhattan up to 80 feet in molten lava. What was once a vast land of streets and neighborhoods is now nothing but blackened boulders volcanic shard. Also, before this major eruption the volcano had been gradually erupting since 1983.

It was fortunate this time around that the volcano did not cause any damage to homes as it has previously. However, the volcano is still being closely monitored and a similar eruption to the eruption in 2018 can still occur again.

Sources

Jones, Caleb. “Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano Erupts, Lava Fountains Form in Park.” AP NEWS, Associated Press, 30 Sept. 2021.’ (IMAGE SOURCE)

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. “Kilauea.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 20 May 2020. 

“Kīlauea.” Kīlauea – Volcano Updates, 17 Oct. 2021.