News Alert: Hawaii volcano Lava fountains SURGE out Kilauea crater & destroyed at least 600 homes
1.48pm update: Salvation Army urges help for donations for the 2,500 displaced The Salvation Army has a distribution center in Pahoa and volunteers are needed to help sort and distribute items.
Donations of food and water should be directed to partner agencies like the Food Basket. Current donations requested for the distribution centre includes: Blankets Camping chairs Clothing Cots Thick outdoor garbage bags Flashlights Pillows Sleeping bags
12.30pm update: There is no end in sight for Kilauea eruption Scientists with the US Geological Survey say they don’t know when the volcanic activity will stop. Late Thursday, the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory reported that fissure 8 “is very active and producing a large channelized flow that has filled in Kapoho Bay.”
HVO said the lava delta is 1.2 miles wide and added that “ocean entry is sending a large laze plume into the air along the coastline.”
11.18am update: Fiery twister captured in Hawaii An incredibly rare phenomenon has been captured on camera as strong winds whipped up a fiery twister, dubbed lavanado, over volcanic fissure eight in Leilani Estates.
Photographer Anthony Quintano said: “I was in a media escort provided by the Hawaii National Guard so we were in Leilani Estates the only legal way to view and cover the lava inside the area. “The fountain was shooting 200 feet in the air and it was roughly a half mile away from where we were standing.”
Volcanologist Dr Janine Crippler and meteorologist Sean Luchs dubbed the event a “volcanic fire whirl”. 10.31am update: Scientists learning important information from Kilauea eruption Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano may be disrupting life in Hawaii’s Big Island, with dramatic explosive eruptions and constant lava flows destroying towns and villages.
But the eruption is helping scientists advance what is already known about volcanoes as the glean new and important information about Kilauea’s crater. Volcanoes reveal secrets when they’re rumbling, which means Kilauea is producing a bonanza of information. And with new technology available, researchers can gather and study an unprecedented volume of data as Kilauea rumbles on. ”
Geophysical monitoring techniques that have come online in the last 20 years have now been deployed at Kilauea,” said George Bergantz, professor of earth and space sciences at the University of Washington. “We have this remarkable opportunity to see many more scales of behaviour both preceding and during this current volcanic crisis.”
9.04am update: An estimated 2,500 people have been displaced by the eruption Hundreds of homes have been destroyed in the Vacationland and Kapoho Bay areas of Big island after the lava flows spread. Most of the losses have occurred in the Leilani Estates area, where the toll of destruction has been steadily rising by the day. “So if you combine the three of them (Kapoho, Vacationland and Leilani), we’re talking about 600 homes,” Kim told reporters. “I’m talking about 600 families. Don’t forget the farmers, don’t forget the ranchers, don’t forget all the employees for them.”
Lava flows have also knocked out telephone and power lines, causing widespread communication outages. And the molten liquid has even forced the shutdown of a geothermal energy plant that provides about a quarter of the island’s electricity.
8.27am update: Amazing aerial footage shows lava fountains spewing out Kilauea Incredible aerial footage released by the United States Geological Survey shows lava bubbling out of the Kilauea volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island. In the video, taken from a helicopter around
6:30 a.m. Tuesday, a fountain of lava feeds into a red-hot river and travels northeast, where it eventually enters the Pacific Ocean through Kapoho Bay. Thick clouds of smoke surrounded the coast as a result of the lava, according to USGS. Before and after photos reveal a vast amount of land near Kapoho Bay now covered in lava.
8.20am update: Millions awarded in disaster relief to the state Governor David Ige took part in a visit to Hawaii County Civil Defense headquarters in Hilo, the island’s biggest city, yesterday. There, he signed a memorandum of understanding furnishing $12 million in immediate state disaster relief to the island.
Ige and Kim also announced formation of a task force of federal, state and local officials to devise a recovery plan for communities devastated by the eruption, with an eye toward preventing such major property losses in the future.