The Kilauea volcano in Hawaii began erupting through a new fissure in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on March 5. This new event, called the Kamoamoa Fissure Eruption, occurred in a forested area and has ignited the vegetation, causing at least 75 acres to burn since Sunday. The eruption is now “paused”, but park ranger Mardie Lane said the fire was creeping through Ohia Forest in an area that has burned at least twice previously because of lava flows. Firefighters planned to fly over the area Tuesday to assess the situation.
Below is a screen grab from a 6-minute video of the new eruption.
The National Park Service has six live cameras in the volcano area.
That looks a little like a two-track road in the photo above, but I’m pretty sure you would not want to drive on it since it is MOLTEN LAVA.
More photos and daily updates of the volcano.
I was on the Kilauea volcano fire in 2002 where I served on a helitack crew for two weeks. From my experience, fighting fire in Hawaii is so different than the lower 48s. You had to fly everywhere, you had to worry about the Vog gas from the volcano, and you were never sure if the ground would give out. Wild.