Kilauea is inflating. The Hawaiian Volcano Observatory’s tiltmeter network has been reporting variable levels of inflation at the summit of the volcano since 27 June. Yesterday, 30 June, the HVO reported that ‘Both Kilauea summit and Pu`u `O`o Cone are inflating. The inflation is accompanied by increased ash production, increased amplitude of seismic tremor bursts, and increased intensity of vent incandescence at the summit’. The fact that the inflation seems to be becoming steadier rather than episodic, and is accompanied by increased tremor and incandescence, suggests the ascent of fresh magma is under way (although at the beginning of this year the ascent of magma within Kilauea took place during a period when the volcano was deflating: Kilauea is full of surprises).

Detailed information on volcanic deformation at Kilauea can be found here: Kilauea deformation. From this source comes the graph below, which shows the tiltmeter data for Pu’u O’o Cone (’POC’) and for Uwekahuna (’UWE’) on the north-western rim of Kilauea crater, for the period 24-30 June.

The general situation at Kilauea is that the Halema’uma’u vent is continuing to produce elevated amounts of sulphur dioxide (the most recent measurements, on 26 June, found the rate to be approximately 900 tonnes per day, as against a normal background rate of 100-150 tonnes per day), and Pu’u O’o crater is also releasing sulphur dioxide. Lava continues to flow to the ocean through the volcanic feature with the name that sounds like a prison movie, the Thanksgiving Eve Breakout.

The HVO has some good images of volcanic activity at and around Kilauea, including the following pictures of a fine littoral explosion at the Waikupanaha ocean entry, caused by the reaction between hot lava and cold seawater. Clicking on the images will take you to the source page, where these pictures were posted on 30 June 2008.

For all our Kilauea coverage: Kilauea << The Volcanism Blog.

Information
Global Volcanism Program: Kilauea - summary information for Kilauea (1302-01-)
USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory - main page for the HVO
HVO Kilauea Status Page - the latest activity reports for Kilauea

On the left, area without vog; on the right, same area with vog. Image: Hawaiian Volcano Observatory.

As Kilauea continues to pump out large quantities of sulphur dioxide and Hawaiian politicians meet to talk about the problem of vog, the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory have put together a timely new page providing extensive information about sulfur dioxide emissions, vog, volcanic ash, and air quality.

Hawaiian Volcano Observatory: sulfur dioxide, vog and volcanic ash FAQ

For all our Kilauea coverage: Kilauea << The Volcanism Blog.

Information
Global Volcanism Program: Kilauea - summary information for Kilauea (1302-01-)
USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory - main page for the HVO
HVO Kilauea Status Page - the latest activity reports for Kilauea

Reuters reports that the State of Alaska is preparing a geothermal leasing programme for Mount Spurr which would allow energy companies to exploit the volcano’s heat sources as a means of generating energy, and that a similar programme is being considered for another Alaskan volcano, Augustine. The Eruptions blog has more.

Only last week Nicaragua announced that it was inviting bids to develop the geothermal potential of San Cristóbal volcano.

An article in the UK Daily Telegraph for 26 June 2008 reports on the resurgence of interest in geothermal power in the United States: ‘According to experts, America is only just waking up to the ancient power source lying beneath dozens of states that has the potential to supply as much as 25 percent of the nation’s energy needs’. If the Telegraph is to be believed, Karl Gawell, executive director of the Geothermal Energy Association, when speaking of current geothermal energy projects and the potential for expansion, actually used the phrase ‘the tip of the iceberg’.

Information
Global Volcanism Program: Spurr - summary information for Spurr (1103-04-)
Global Volcanism Program: Augustine - summary information for Augustine (1103-01-)
Global Volcanism Program: San Cristóbal - summary information for San Cristóbal (1404-02=)
The plus side of volcanoes: geothermal energy - general information on geothermal energy from the Cascades Volcano Observatory

News
Harness volcano power, energy experts say - Daily Telegraph, 26 June 2008
Alaska plans geothermal leasing at volcano - Reuters, 24 June 2008
Nicaragua seeks bids on energy from largest volcano - Bloomberg, 19 June 2008

Over at Eruptions Erik Klemetti has a succinct, informative post on Kilauea that reminds me that I’ve been neglecting that particular volcano lately, and am conscious of it, but in truth there’s been little new to report during May and June. Halema’uma’u Crater continues to erupt small amounts of ash and high levels of sulphur dioxide, SO² continues to issue from Pu’u ‘o’o crater, lava continues to reach the sea at the Waikupanaha ocean entry. A week-by-week summary of eruptive activity at Kilauea can be found at the Global Volcanism Program.

Locally the issue of vog is causing concern: The Kauai Garden Island News reports on the first hearings of the state House committee on vog, and The Honolulu Advertiser comments that the hearings showed that no-one really knows just how dangerous vog is and how best people can adjust to living with it:

Doctors had no hard data showing the vog is causing new ailments. Emergency responders discussed Big Island evacuation plans, but didn’t know how bad the vog would have to get before becoming a public health crisis. Only a few things were certain: Big Island residents will have to learn to live with the vog for the foreseeable future, and those suffering respiratory illnesses need to find ways to cope depending on their symptoms.

For all our Kilauea coverage: Kilauea << The Volcanism Blog.

Information
Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program - summary information for Kilauea (1302-01-)
USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory - main page for the HVO
HVO Kilauea Status Page - the latest activity reports for Kilauea

News
State vog committee meets today - Kauai Garden Island News, 20 June 2008
No clear answers yet to health risks of vog - Honolulu Advertiser, 20 June 2008

There’s an interesting pairing of topographic views at the NASA Earth Observatory right now: a comparison of Chaitén and Mount St Helens volcanoes. The images are derived from elevation data collected by the Advanced Spaceborne Emission and Reflective Radiometer (ASTER) on NASA’s Terra satellite. The data for Chaitén were collected on 1 April 2006, before the current eruption, and the data for Mount St Helens were collected on 31 May 2007.

The images are to a uniform scale. Perhaps the most immediately striking thing is how large a feature Chaitén is, with its 2.5×4km caldera: the Global Volcanism Program calls it ’small’, which in comparison to Santorini (12×7km), Crater Lake (8×10km), or a real monster like Toba (35×100km), is probably fair enough, but it’s still pretty sizeable. The crater left at Mount St Helens by the May 1980 eruption looks quite modest by comparison, but is nothing of the kind, of course. It was also formed in quite a different way, through a catastrophic explosion; the Chaitén caldera was formed by the volcano collapsing into its own emptied magma chamber. Except when viewed from above Chaitén is an inconspicuous part of the landscape being low in elevation, the rim reaching 1122m at its highest point. Mount St Helens, at 2549m, is more than twice its height. It’s interesting to ponder what kind and size of edifice Chaitén was before the eruption that brought about its collapse into a caldera, 10,000 or so years ago.

For all our Chaitén coverage: Chaitén << The Volcanism Blog

Information
Global Volcanism Program: Chaitén - summary information for Chaitén (1508-41)
Global Volcanism Program: Mount St Helens - summary information for Mount St Helens (1201-05-)
USGS Photo Glossary: caldera - definition, explanation and illustration of ‘caldera’ from the USGS
Global Volcanism Program: calderas - more about calderas from the GVP’s ‘Types and Processes Gallery’

Dave Schumaker at Geology News has uploaded a fascinating time-lapse video from the USGS showing the growth of the lava dome at Mount St Helens between November 2004 and February 2008. The Cascades Volcano Observatory noted in a 21 February 2008 update that growth of the lava dome paused in late January 2008, and no growth has taken place since.

Given the dome-building process now under way at Chaitén, this video is a topical find. Unscientific musing: the St Helens dome looks quite sinister at times, although not as downright wicked-looking as the one at Kelut (image comes from here).

Geology News >> Video of Mount St. Helens Lava Dome Growth

Information
Smithsonian Institution Global Volcanism Program - summary information for Mount St Helens (1201-05-)
CVO Mount St. Helens - current activity information page from the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory

On this day twenty-eight years ago, 18 May 1980, Mount St Helens in Washington State, USA, erupted in the most destructive and deadly volcanic eruption in United States history. Fifty-seven people were killed, over one billion dollars of economic damage done, and vast stretches of landscape laid waste by this cataclysmic event.

Resources
Global Volcanism Program: Mount St. Helens - summary information for Mount St Helens (1201-05-)
CVO Menu - Mount St. Helens, Washington - Cascades Volcano Observatory main page for Mount St Helens
CVO Menu - Mount St. Helens - May 18, 1980 - links to a large number of USGS publications and other resources dealing with the eruption
Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument - an 110,000-acre area around the volcano, created ‘for research, recreation and education’
Mt St Helens - 25 Years Later - online feature from local Washington newspaper The Daily News, created in 2005 for the 25th anniversary of the eruption

‘Volcano observatory could make a seismic shift to WSUV’ reports The Columbian on 4 May, employing some of the brilliantly clever headline wordplay that makes local newspaper journalism such a ceaseless delight. The suggestion is that the USGS’s Cascades Volcano Observatory, currently situated in ‘a nondescript business park’ in east Vancouver, would move to Washington State University’s ’sprawling campus in Salmon Creek’. The advantages to both the observatory and the university, in terms of locating a world-class scientific facility in the heart of a teaching- and research-active university community, are clear. No move will happen, however, until the CVO’s current lease comes to an end in 2012.

One of the many benefits of the move to WSUV, notes the report,  would be that ’scientists working in the observatory could peek up from their desks and observe at least three volcanoes directly — St. Helens, Adams and Hood’.

The NASA Earth Observatory Natural Hazards website has published satellite images from 26 April 2008 showing recent eruptive activity at Kilauea, Hawaii.

26 April 2008: Image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite showing a blue-white plume of vog blowing westward over the Pacific Ocean from Hawaii. Link to image.

26 April 2008: Image from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on NASA’s Aura satellite showing sulphur dioxide levels in the lowest 5km of the atmosphere. The image clearly shows the high concentrations that were present. Link to image.

Hawaii Magazine reports that the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park has just re-opened, and their man Bill Harby is breathing easier: ‘It’s nice to look out my window just a few miles from the crater and see the rain forest instead of the vog’. The park has been closed for two days because of hazardous emissions from Kilauea.

For all our Kilauea coverage: Kilauea << The Volcanism Blog