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| Kilauea is a shield volcano closely resembling Mauna Loa in structure. The montain rises more than 20,000 feet above the ocean floor and has been formed largely by eruptions along two rift zones extending from the summit caldera.
The Kilauea summit caldera is two and a half miles long by two miles wide and is floored by nearly 2,600 acres of lava flows erupted since the late 19th century.
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Shortly after midnight on January 2, 1983, the summit of Kilauea began to deflate rapidly. Earthquakes moved down the east rift zones, and on January 3, lava erupted along narrow openings (fissures) that extended nearly five miles. After six months of volcanic activity (see pictures of eruptive episodes 1-3
), the eruption localized at the Pu'u 'O'o vent, which straddles the eastern boundary of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.
For the next three years (see episodes 4 - 47 Hawaii volcano pictures), Pu'u 'O'o erupted approx. every three to four weeks, usually for less than 24 hours. These eruptive episodes were characterized by spectacular lava fountains that catapulted lava higher than 1,500 feet above the vent.
The flows posed an immediate threat to the sparsely populated Royal Gardens subdivision, located on a steep slope 3.5 miles southeast of the vent. Flows reached the subdivision in as little as 13 hours during several eruptive episodes and destroyed 16 houses in 1983 and 1984 (see pictures).
In July 1986, the eruption shifted to a new vent, Kupaianaha, one and a half miles northeast of Pu'u 'O'o. This marked the beginning of five and a half years of nearly continuous, quiet outpouring of lava (see episode 48 pictures).
Late in November 1986, flows from Kupaianaha reached the ocean, cutting a narrow track through Kapa'ahu and closing the coastal highway. A few weeks later, the lava took a more easterly course and overran 14 homes on the northwest edge of Kalapana. From mid-1987 through 1989, most of the lava that erupted from Kupaianaha flowed directly to the sea.
In June of 1989, lava flows overran the Waha'ula Visitor Center in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. A year later, the eruption turned toward Kalapna, an area cherished for its historic sites and black sand beaches. By the end of the summer, the entire community (including 103 homes) lay buried under 50 - 80 feet of lava.
The volume of lava erupted from Kupaianaha steadily declined through 1991. On February 7, 1992, the Kupaianaha vent was dead. Ten days later, the eruption returned to Pu'u 'O'o. As at Kupaianaha, the style of the ruption was nearly continuous and quiet.
In November 1992, lava crossed the Chain of Craters Road in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and entered the ocean at Kamoamoa, seven miles from the vents. Over the next month, flows buried Kamoamoa, and a black sand beach formed.
Episode 55 began on February 24, 1997, when a lava pond returned to the Pu'u 'O'o crater. In June 1997, the pond inside Pu'u 'O'o rose until it overtopped the gap in the west wall of the cone formed by the January 1997 collapse, and lava spilled from the crater for the first time in 11 years.
The Pu'u 'O'o-Kupaianaha eruption is the first eruption outside the summit caldera in the last 500 years that has lasted longer than half a decade. Almost one-half cubic miles of lava has erupted from the east rift zone of Kilauea since the eruption began in 1983. Flows have buried 39 square miles and have added 505 acres of new land to the southern coast of Kilauea. As of April 2001, the eruption gives no signs of winding down.