NOTE: Because of the current volcanic activity some items in this week’s Volcano Watch update may appear out-of-date due to the quickly evolving eruption of Kilauea.

May 2, 2018 Pu’u ‘O’o Vent Empty! from Mick Kalber on Vimeo.

Video courtesy of Tropical Visions Video with air transportation by Paradise Helicopters.

https://youtu.be/xyBuFzGNYzw
Time-lapse thermal image movie of Halemaumau Overlook Vent. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie of Halemaumau Overlook Vent. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie of Halemaʻumaʻu Overlook Vent from Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie of KÄ«lauea Caldera from Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

(Activity updates are written by scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory.)

This past week, KÄ«lauea Volcano’s summit lava lake level dropped with summit deflation, and was about 160 m (525 ft) below the vent rim as of May 5 at 9:30 p.m. HST. On the East Rift Zone, the 61g lava flow is no longer active. Episode 62 commenced on KÄ«lauea’s lower East Rift Zone on May 3, with at least 10 fissures (as of May 6) opening within the Leilani Estates subdivision in the lower Puna District. Both eruptions, summit and East Rift Zone, are dynamic, and additional changes will be reported on HVO’s website at https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/status.html.

Mauna Loa is not erupting. Rates of deformation and seismicity have not changed significantly over the past week.

More than 100 earthquakes were reported felt in Hawaii during the past week. The largest of these earthquakes was a magnitude-6.9 event located about 16 km (10 mi) southwest of Leilani Estates on the Island of Hawai‘i at a depth of 5.0 km (3.1 mi). It occurred at 12:32 p.m. on May 4, and was one of 14 earthquakes with magnitudes of 4.0 or greater to occur that day.

Please visit HVO’s website (https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hvo) for past Volcano Watch articles, Kīlauea daily eruption updates, Mauna Loa weekly updates, volcano photos, maps, recent earthquake info, and more. Call for summary updates at 808-967-8862 (Kīlauea) or 808-967-8866 (Mauna Loa). Email questions to askHVO@usgs.gov.

https://youtu.be/qHZr72s-tRI
Time-lapse movie from images gathered from a temporary thermal camera looking into Pu’u ‘O’o Crater. The temperature scale is in degrees Celsius up to a maximum of 500 Celsius (932 Fahrenheit) for this camera model, and scales based on the maximum and minimum temperatures within the frame. Thick fume, image pixel size and other factors often result in image temperatures being lower than actual surface temperatures. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie of Pu’u ‘O’o Crater. April 26, 2018 to May 6, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie of Pu’u ‘O’o Crater East Flank. April 26, 2018 to May 3, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

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Time-lapse movie from a camera positioned on the southeast flank of Puʻu ʻŌʻō, looking toward the active flow advancing to the southeast. The breakout point is at the left edge of the image, and the mid-field skyline at the right is roughly coincident with the top of the pali. April 26, 2018 to May 3, 2018. Images courtesy of USGS/HVO

Starting on the afternoon of Monday, April 30, 2018, magma beneath Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō drained and triggered the collapse of the crater floor. Within hours, earthquakes began migrating east of Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō, signaling an intrusion of magma along the middle and lower East Rift Zone. As of about noon on Wednesday, May 2, these earthquakes continue along the lower East Rift Zone, with many reports of earthquakes felt by residents in nearby subdivisions. The orange dashed line marks the approximate area within which most of the earthquakes are located based on automatic earthquake locations and analysis by seismologists. All earthquake locations are preliminary. For more details on the hazards associated with this ongoing event, see this link: https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/status.html

This map shows recent changes to KÄ«lauea’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. Older Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō lava flows (1983–2016) are shown in gray. The yellow line is the trace of the active lava tubes. The Kamokuna ocean entry is inactive. The blue lines over the Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō flow field are steepest-descent paths calculated from a 2013 digital elevation model (DEM), while the blue lines on the rest of the map are steepest-descent paths calculated from a 1983 DEM (for calculation details, see http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2007/1264/). Steepest-descent path analysis is based on the assumption that the DEM perfectly represents the earth’s surface. DEMs, however, are not perfect, so the blue lines on this map can be used to infer only approximate flow paths. The base map is a partly transparent 1:24,000-scale USGS digital topographic map draped over the 1983 10-m digital elevation model (DEM).