Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano spits out red hot lava
Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano has spectacularly resumed its recent eruption. Lava was fired into over 1,000 feet of sky.
Volcanoes in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and Hawaii are spitting out lava enough to cause a swarm of news stories. But despite the shock and intense heartbeat, geologists say there is no cause for the alarm.
“Volcanoes are unpredictable and there is always a chance that something bad can happen, but these recent seismic events along the Pacific Ring from Alaska to Washington to offshore Oregon probably don’t directly relate to each other.
“This is what a volcano does,” she said. “They come back to life for a while. Sometimes seismic activity leads to eruptions, sometimes not.”
Most of the US volcanoes that had been signaling themselves since spring woke up, shaking and falling asleep.
Two in Hawaii and the other in Alaska, are in the middle of active, but relatively small, non-threatening eruptions.
It may all look ominous, but it’s not. It is simply a part of the life of a dynamic and seismically active planet.
There is no direct connection to any of these, Rupert said. “The distance between these (earthquake) activity centers is thousands of miles.”
Recent US volcanic activity
Volcanoes have always been part of the geography of the West Coast, but this may seem to be a particularly busy time for these mountains, caused by cracks in the Earth’s crust, for these mountains descending into the mantle below.
But seismologists and volcanologists are paying attention to them, Rupert said. “This is why the federal government funds earthquake and volcano monitoring efforts internally and through the USGS sector.”
Consider these events:
- Over 300 earthquakes were hit by Mount Rainier in Washington in early July. This is the largest earthquake swarm ever recorded on a volcano. The herd, a cluster of earthquakes in the same area, began on July 8th. Within two days, 334 earthquakes were identified by the Pacific Northwest Earthquake Network. But that’s not so unusual for a majestic volcano about 70 miles southeast of Seattle. Seattle registered a similar earthquake in 2009. However, Rainier’s final eruption was about 1,000 years ago, Ruppert said.
- In northern Washington, Alaska has three volcanoes that make you feel yourself now.
- As of July 10th, Alaska’s great Sitkin volcano in the Aleu Islands was at alert level for lava erupting clocks in the Summit Crater. The level of earthquakes was sometimes low with small earthquakes, according to the USGS. The eruption began in May 2021. Lava has been erupting at the summit since July 2021.
- On Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula, there was a gust of wind from a small earthquake that shook the Iliamna volcano on June 15th. However, on July 1st, the volcano was set to the normal warning code.
- Mount Sprue, another Alaska volcano north of Iliamna, has been experiencing shallow earthquake swarms since February. It is currently at the normal level of advisory. For now, there are few concerns, Rupert said.
- Seismicians are also monitoring the sailors on the axis, a huge undersea volcano 300 miles off the coast, down the west coast. It has been attracting attention for several months as scientists prepare for the expected eruption in 2025. It’s underwater so far, so only scientists using a series of instruments know about the eruption.
The volcano is a seismically active region that stretches from the southern tip of South America, known as The Ring of Fire, what is called The Ring of Fire, a 25,000-mile horseshoe volcano, and extends along the US west coast, Alaska’s west coast, from Japan to New Zealand.
According to the US Geological Survey, it is the world’s most seismic and volcanic active zone, created by the Pacific upper plates sinking beneath the North American plate.
Eruptions in Hawaii
To the west of Hawaii, Mount Kilauea continues to erupt, but as of July 11th it does not show the lava fountain seen at the beginning of the month. On July 9, the USGS said the recent eruption had ended.
Hawaiian volcanoes are not part of the ring of fire. The island’s chains were formed by volcanic hotspots that produced 15 volcanoes extending 3,800 miles across the Pacific Ocean (still is).
In Hawaii, volcanoes are the result of heat sources deep in the Earth’s mantle. Magma plumes coming from underwater hotspots move slowly over the Pacific plate (2-4 inches per year).
That’s why the oldest volcano in Hawaii in Kauai is 5.5 million years old, and the most recent big island is “only 700,000 years” and is still growing.
