Images

View looking down onto the northeastern vent.

Lava, erupting from the southwestern vent of the Kamoamoa eruption, fountains above the surrounding forest.

Overview of the Kamoamoa eruption looking south. The northeastern vent is to the left, and the southwestern vent is to the upper right. A river of lava, erupting from the southwestern vent, can be seen advancing toward the southeast through forest within Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park.

A piece of spatter ejected on March 7, 2011. Handheld GPS for scale

Views into the Halema‘uma‘u vent have been largely obscured by fume over the past several days, and the only consistent views have been with a thermal camera, which can "see" through the fume. This thermal image was taken at a nearly vertical angle from a helicopter, in order to see the bottom of the extremely deep and narrow vent cavity.

With lava retreating deeper into the Halema‘uma‘u vent cavity over the past two days, the cavity walls have experienced more frequent collapses. At 2:23pm today, a collapse from the upper portion of the vent cavity produced a robust brown plume, but did not eject any large particles.

A close-up of the flow front in the forest.

Lava from the erupting fissure produced a large flow that is moving southeast through the adjacent forest.

Lava was reaching heights above the tree line.

A view of the spattering source from the ground.

On the west end of the fissure system, spatter ramparts are forming as the lava fallout solidifies in a mound upwind from the source.

A broad view of the Kamoamoa fissures. The fissures extend 2.3 km (1.4 mi) between Nāpau Crater and Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō. The western most fissure is just out of view in this photo.

Measuring the flow thickness from another section of the ‘A‘ā flow, using a 1 m (3.2 ft) orange pole for scale.

The east rift zone eruption is currently in a hiatus. The east and west Kamoamoa fissures are still fuming, but no lava is erupting. Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō is the fuming cone in the background.

Fume from Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō has diminished enough to see a portion of the rubble-filled crater floor.

Gobs of spatter solidified in the remaining trees. The spatter was erupted from the first fissure to open on March 5.

Ground cracks between the east and west Kamoamoa fissure segments. Geologist is about 6 ft tall.

This thermal image was taken from a helicopter above the active fountains at the west end of the fissure system. There were two adjacent fountaining areas, with one situated within a spatter cone and the other bursting through a perched lava pond. The fountains were feeding a channelized flow that can be seen in the upper right portion of the image.

This thermal image shows the channelized ‘A‘ā flow that was being fed by the fountains at the west end of the fissure system today. Near the end of the flow, the channel empties into the delta-like flow front.

The eastern vent complex of the Kamoamoa eruption was inactive today, but it continues to emit a thick gas plume.

The western vent complex continues to erupt, and had been doing so for about 30 hours as of the time of this photo. Lava erupting from the vent complex is flowing into a channel with levees.