Photo & Video Chronology - Kilauea Archive

11 October 2001

Two active ocean entries

Kamoamoa: East wind blows steam from several ocean entries along front of Kamoamoa bench. The active, west bench is filling an indentation in the coastline; the old sea cliff is partly mantled with drapery from lava falls last week. The east, inactive bench is just east of the point but has been mostly eroded away. Note the discolored water plume coming mainly from the active ocean entries.

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East Kupapa`u: Looking west across large bench built out from old sea cliff. Steam rises from actual entry point, and wispy fume just above old cliff comes from skylight in tube feeding lava to the bench. Visitor viewing area is in lower right.

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13 October 2001

Breakout nears East Kupapa`u entry bench

Small pahoehoe flow within about 50 m of sea cliff north of active East Kupapa`u bench. Steam in background rises from ongoing ocean entry.

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14 October 2001

Kamoamoa ocean entry is waning

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Left: Predawn glow at 0602 coming from seaward tip of new bench, the only entry active this morning. Right: Even a beautiful Hawaiian sunrise at 0619 can't spur the entry on to bigger and better things.

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Left: Small littoral explosion at 0641, taking place where lava is entering the water. Dark cloud is full of glass blasted from the lava and quenched by the steam. Large image shows projectiles just left of steam cloud. Right: Back-lit view of west bench of Kamoamoa at 0656, showing the black sand beach under construction at the seaward edge of the bench. Lava has not added to this part of the bench in several days, so surf action is eroding a cliff and depositing black sand in front of it. Steam from the single entry point just visible in upper right.

Map shows lava flows erupted during the 1983-present activity of Pu`u `O`o and Kupaianaha (see large map). The flows active from December 17, 2000 through September 30, 2001 are shown in red; the west flow is indicated by the cross-hatched red flow that enters the ocean at Kamoamoa.

Most of the recent flows are fed from breakout points at 1920-1700 feet, above Pulama pali in the northern part of the large red area. Lava re-entered the sea near Kamokuna (just east of Kamoamoa) on January 21, 2001, but soon stopped when activity shifted from the western to the eastern branch of the flow. Since then, activity has been divided between the eastern and western branches. Breakouts from the eastern tube system have destroyed hundreds of meters of the Royal Gardens access road.

Lava has been entering the ocean and building a large bench at East Kupapa`u since April 25. A tiny trickle of lava fed through the western tube system dripped into the water just east of Kamoamoa on May 31 but stopped within a day. Since then, all lava entering the sea had gone through the East Kupapa`u entry until September 28-29, when the new entry at Kamoamoa started. 

Eruption-viewing opportunities change constantly, refer to the HVO home page for current information. Those readers planning a visit to Kilauea or Mauna Loa volcanoes can get much useful information from Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park.