Occasional updates on Kilauea Eruptions

The "Pu`u `O`o" eruption of Kilauea's East Rift Zone

Happy 28th Birthday to Pu`u `O`o on 3 Jan 2011
Please visit the HVO website for volcano updates, the live Puu Oo Webcam, and recent eruption images
-AND- the NEW Hawaii VOG Forecast Website

puu oo cone in eruption
One Fine Daybreak at the Pu`u `O`o cone in 1997

Information and Links:

Current eruption information for visitors to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park from the National Park Service at 808-985-6000 or their web site: Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.
Detailed eruption and background information from the USGS Hawaii Volcano Obervatory web site at: http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/kilauea/update/.
Near real-time images of the Big Island obtained by the NOAA GOES-9 satellite at: http://virtual1.pgd.hawaii.edu/goes/
Kilauea Photo gallery by the Honolulu Advertiser for the 25th anniversary of the eruption.

Eruption returns to Puu Oo crater after earlier floor collapse and new fissure eruption at Napau Crater (March 2011)

HVO reported that at 10:09 a.m. HST March 26, 2011, lava returned to the Puu Oo crater after a 17-day hiatus in activity there. The return was accompanied by a brief burst of seismic tremor and a short (1 hr long) sequence of deflation followed by inflation.
6 March 2011: The floor of Puu Oo crater collapsed spectacularly in the past few days and a new fissure eruption opened up in Napau Crater. This sequence of activity is reminiscent of 1997, when the Puu Oo cone became temporarily inactive and a fissure eruption opened up 2 km away, at Napau. The reduced and cropped images at left are from HVO website

The sequence of events are described here, condensced from the the HVO press release:

At 1:42 p.m. HST (5 Mar 2011), the USGS HVO monitoring network detected rapid deflation at Pu'u 'O'o and increased tremor along Kilauea's middle east rift zone.

At 2:00 p.m., Kilauea's summit also began to deflate.

From 2:16 to 2:21 p.m., the floor of the Pu'u 'O'o crater began to collapse, and within 10 minutes, incandescent ring fractures opened on the crater floor a few tens of meters away from the crater wall. As the floor continued to drop, lava appeared in the center of the crater floor, the northeast spatter cone within Pu'u 'O'o collapsed, and an obvious scarp developed on the west side of the crater floor, with lava cascading over the scarp toward the center of the crater.

At 2:41 p.m., the scarp on the west side of the crater floor appeared to disintegrate, exposing incandescent rubble. Five minutes later, the collapse of a large block along the east crater wall produced a dust plume.

Webcam images showed that the Pu'u 'O'o crater floor continued to drop through 4:26 p.m.

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Wall collapse at Lava lake at Kilauea Summit (Halemaumau) (March 2011)
things have been heating up again at Halemaumau with a roiling lava lake in the active pit. Check out the action from the HVO web cam

explosive eruption rocks Halemaumau in 2008
HVO reported that a small explosion occurred at the Kilauea summit in the very early hours of March 19, 2008, making this the first explosion there since 1924. Lava was not erupted during the gas explosion, but lithic blocks were scattered over a 75 acre region in an often visited part of Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park. A 20-30 m wide crater was formed in the explosion, in the same area where intense sulfur dioxide gas venting has been occuring lately, with incandescent (hot) rocks has been occuring over the past week or so. The largest piece of material ejected in the explosion is believed to measure about a cubic meter. The HVO webvsite has additional information, photos, and a newly installed Halemaumau webcam for your reading and viewing pleasure.

Earlier Updates: A detailed chronological summary of events during 'episode 55' (1997-2005) of the Pu`u `O`o eruption can be found on the episode 55 page.
PLEASE NOTE: HCV had been posting detailed eruption updates in the 1990s before web capability was established at HVO on the Big Island. HCV discontinued these detailed updates in late 1999 The latest updates can be now obtained from the Kilauea Update page of the USGS-HVO website

Visit our LISTING of Pu`u `O`o eruption episodes for a summary of previous activity and links to previous eruption update pages (where available).

CREDITS and DISCLAIMER:
This synopsis was written by Ken Rubin using provided by the U.S.Geological Survey's Hawaii Volcano Observatory (in the form of formal press releases, personal communications and information from their HVO web site). The US Geological Survey-Hawaiian Volcano Observatory is not directly responsible for editorial changes or enhancements made by the HCV (the Hawaii Center for Volcanology) web staff, nor does it claim responsiblity in any way for the interpretive content of these pages.


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Last page update on 27 Mar 2011