Loading ...This went out with my Christmas cards to friends and family, far and wide, so I thought I would post it here for my tent family also.
It has been an eventful year here and we are rather glad to see it go. Being a homeowner with 1/3 acre lot getting 150+ inches of rain a year is an ongoing job of removing weeds, vines, rotting wood, and general green waste. Several pickup trucks per week when we are working at it. And ‘retirement’ is a lot of work!
My house is built on a slab foundation atop gravel fill only a couple feet deep over the lava rock base. It is a good design for earthquakes as the slab floats as a single piece and the house holds together well. This was proven this year in late May when the second biggest earthquake ever recorded on the Big Island here struck us. It was a Magnitude 6.9 earthquake that went on (and on, and on…) for a full 40 seconds. That feels like an eternity when you are riding a chair like a bucking bronco wondering when it will stop. It is awesome to contemplate how much energy it takes to throw that much rock around for that long. The house survived with no damage. But it was only the beginning…
The geologists said that the earthquake broke an underground dike in the volcano plumbing, as the two active craters that were slowly bubbling lava suddenly collapsed and drained down into the mountain. Smaller earthquake shudders indicated the lava was moving downslope below the east rift zone. The east rift ridge began to swell and crack open and vent sulfur gas until fissure #8 began to actively erupt lava. This crater ridge is in the middle of the Leilani Estates subdivision, which was built in an area that had actively erupted in 1955 and 1960, and classed as “Lava Zone 1”… subject to eruption at any time. Creepy place to build homes, but some did… and lost everything.
There ensued a months long eruption with massive outflows of lava. The lava flowed downslope over 8 miles to the sea at Kapoho. Over 700 homes were lost, more than 2000 people displaced, and the whole Southeast corner of the island was isolated by lava. The eruptive vent was at 600 feet elevation about 5 miles south of my home, which is downslope at 300 feet elevation. The flow maps indicated we were likely OK if lava came this way, but you never know. It was a tense six months while record amounts of lava flowed down that river just a few miles away. We had red skies every night as the clouds reflected the red glowing lava below. It looked like a distant forest fire. Along with lava comes kilo-tonnage of Sulfur Dioxide smoke and fumes from the volcano vent. Fortunately we were mostly upwind at my house, but the south side of the island and the Kona coast were wrapped in “VOG”…. volcano smog…. for months.
People up at Kilauea summit area in Volcano village endured 3 magnitude earthquakes several times per hour as the summit crater collapsed and caved in on itself, pressurized the magma below, and forced out more lava from the lower east rift, some 3500 feet lower down the mountain. Finally it all ended quite suddenly as the summit collapse earthquakes stopped, and the lava outflows also stopped down below. The volcano has reached a stable equilibrium and for the first time since 1983 there is no visible lava nor volcanic activity to be seen. You never know for sure, but it could be quiet like this for years before the magma very slowly refills from below. So it has been a very exciting year living on the most active volcano on the planet. Hope you enjoy this holiday season! Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!
–Maya