Images

Over the past two weeks, there have been at least three breakouts within 100 m (330 ft) of the Kamokuna ocean entry. The western-most breakout (pictured above) had no visible surface breakouts on the cliff today (October 6), but was producing a nice cascading ‘A‘ā flow off the edge of the cliff and onto the delta.

Image taken by a time-lapse camera of multiple lava cascades on the sea cliff on October 4 at 3:31 am (HST). Just a few of the many resulting surface flows can be seen on the delta both below the cliff and near the front, which is lit by lava and moonlight.

Image taken by a time-lapse camera on October 5 at 6:11 pm (HST), with the lava streams showing up nicely as the sun starts to go down.

A small channel flowing down the cliff to the delta creates an ‘A‘ā fan at its distal tip. Many lava falls over the past week have locally built up the height of the sea cliff and covered much of the blocky rigid cliff face.

The 1917 Curtis relief model of Kīlauea Volcano's summit shows many well-known geologic features, including the summit caldera (large depression), Halema‘uma‘u (crater within the caldera), Kīlauea Iki (crater at far right), and elaborate drainage patterns (foreground). Photo by Burr A. Church.

This view of Halema‘uma‘u as it appeared in the 1917 relief model by George Carroll Curtis shows fine details around the crater, including the first road for automobiles, which ended near the crater rim. The light-colored circular feature around Halema‘uma‘u is a nearly continuous escarpment along which subsidence occurred. Photo by Burr A. Church.

USGS research geophysicist Danny Brothers (right) and colleagues examine the surface of a sediment grab sample just pulled onto the deck of the Canadian Coast Guard Ship John P. Tully. The sample was collected from the top of a mud volcano north of the border between southeast Alaska and British Columbia.

Aerial view of Spirit Lake (center) looking north from above the crater of Mount St. Helens. The lake's outlet to the west (left) was blocked by the 1980 landslide, which required a new engineered outlet to maintain the lake at a safe level. A tunnel was drilled through a bedrock ridge on west side of lake in 1984-1985. Glacier covered Mount Rainier in distance.

This western breakout also began on September 23, at a distance of approximately 90 m (98 yards) from the sea cliff. This pāhoehoe (bottom edge has a yellow dotted outline) was more viscous than the breakout to the east, so the surface texture is less smooth and reflective, making it harder to distinguish between the older flows.

A weak plume today (September 26) on the far (west) side of the delta provided great views of changes at the ocean entry. Over the past few weeks there have been repeated breakouts on the delta which have resurfaced over half of the roughly 10 acre (4 hectare) delta, as mapped on September 21.

A view of the breakout point of the easternmost of two short-lived breakouts that began on September 23. This thin pāhoehoe breakout (lighter flow in center of photo) started approximately 45 m (49 yards) upslope of the sea cliff, and on the eastern side of the lava tube that feeds the ocean entry.

HVO geologists change data cards on a time-lapse camera positioned on the rim of the west pit within Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō Crater. A lava pond has been active in this pit for over a year, and the time-lapse camera tracks changes in the pond activity.

An example time-lapse image from the camera shown to the left. This image is from September 14 and shows typical activity in the lava pond, with spattering along the western pond margin.

This map shows recent changes to Kīlauea's East Rift Zone lava flow field. The area of the active flow field as of September 1 is shown in pink, while widening and advancement of the active flow as of September 21 is shown in red. Older Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō lava flows (1983-2016) are shown in gray. The yellow line is the trace of the active lava tube.

This map is similar to the map above but shows a thermal map over the Episode 61g lava flow. Cooler colors (blue and green) show cooled, inactive portions of the flow surface. Hot colors (red and orange) show areas of active surface breakouts.

Aerial view of Halema‘uma‘u, showing typical spattering activity at the south lake margin. Golden brown Pele's hair is covering the previous lake overflows which are darker in color. The plume was light at the time of the overflight, allowing a view of the southern wall, which recently experienced two collapses exposing the lighter wall rock beneath.

Aerial view from the top of the pali, looking towards the ocean entry. The lighter silver lava flow breakouts over the past week have spread out at the base of the pali. The closest location of activity is 1.6 km (1 mile) from the gravel road. Fume is rising from the main lava tube on the right of the image.

The front half of the lava delta is shown, with an open lava stream left of center. In the upper left is a circular rubble feature, called a shatter ring, which formed between Aug 15 and Sept 19, and is the source of many of the lava flows on the left (west) side of the image.

Scientists prepare to lower a piston corer off Haida Gwaii, British Columbia, to sample seafloor sediment near the Queen Charlotte-Fairweather fault. Expedition scientists are studying layers of sediment in the cores they collected to identify and determine ages of past earthquakes along the fault.

Top: Map view of well recorded historical seismicity at Mount Rainier since 2007 (gray circles) with seismicity since September 11 plotted as filled red circles. Location of seismic stations indicated by arrows. Bottom: Cross-sectional view looking north shows earthquake depths. Black outline is a west-east elevation profile of Mount Rainier.

This video shows the Kamokuna lava delta growing and sinking over a 1 month time span between 15 August 2017 and 19 September 2017. Made from one image every other day. The video is looped 10 times, with the loop number in the upper left corner.