Gallons of red-hot lava have been pouring out from Hawaii's Kilauea volcano.
On May 24, two new breakouts from the Kilauea volcano located in Big Island sent lava to continuously flow down the Pu'u 'O'o cone. The flows spanning the northwest and southeast sides of the cone come from the volcano's Pu'u 'O'o vent that is noted to be erupting since 1983.
"The two new lava flows from Puʻu ʻOʻo that emerged from the flanks of the cone on May 24 are still active. Scattered lava flow activity continues on the June 27th lava flow field within about 5 kilometers (3 miles) northeast of Puʻu ʻOʻo," the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO) posted in its website.
Kilauea is one of the most active volcanoes in the world. Since its formation about 300,000 to 600,000 years ago, it has not gone into any prolonged period of quiescence.
The volcano has a big crater atop a mountain that explodes from time to time so seeing fissure eruptions like these are fairly common - but they are a sight to behold nonetheless. As the lava flows, the magma is pushed along the thin cracks of the surface of the dikes that make up the new earth.
The HVO said that every area of the east rift zone, which extends from Kilauea's main crater down to the ocean floor at more than 16,000 feet, has been having fissure eruptions since 250 years ago. The whole zone contains lava originating from eruptions in the last 400 years.
Last year, the U.S. Geological Survey expressed concerns that the continuous ground shift, earthquakes and decreased lava levels were preparing Kilauea for eruption. However, the current eruptions are not expected to pose any threat to the communities near the volcano.
The lava flows appear small when seen from afar, but these are actually large, with some having a width of as much as 32 feet.
Kilauea translates to "spewing" or "much spreading" - something that it has been doing in the past few days. Watch the video below.
