I'd like to be a pilot.

Seriously, helicopters are possibly the coolest mode of transportation that I have ever experienced. The helicopter is so small and light (with no doors!) that the winds were pushing us around, but somehow we managed to get to where we needed to go.

All HVO volunteers are taken up to the skies at least once during the visit, and my turn came last Friday morning (11/20). Conditions were ripe for a smooth flight, with bright blue skies and relatively light mist over Pu`u `O`o. We started our brief journey by flying over Halema`uma`u (and we swerved on my side so that I was directly over the vent, staring Pele in the face).

Above is Kelly photographing the summit vent, and below, an artsy photo while we're landing.

The view of the ocean entry with the big plumes (Waikupanaha), and you can see the new ocean entry (West Waikupanaha) with the smaller plume in the distance.

Fun with the camera while we're on the ground...

We took a short stop to sample the fresh flows west of the lava tube. This was the most active (aka fastest) lava I've seen yet! Also, flightsuits are hott. I'm getting one when I get home.

What an adrenaline rush! I have to do this again sometime.

All photos in this post are property of the USGS.

What I came to Hawai`i to see (besides lava)

Public Hawksbill turtle nest excavation at Puna Lu`u on Veteran's Day:




There's no doubt that these are the most adorable creatures on Earth. It was so special for all of us to see these lil' babies encounter water for the first time, especially since no one will ever see the males again and the females lead such epic lives. They're fearlessly and innocently heading into an incredibly deadly environment because, well, there's no other option. I don't know about you, but I'm inspired. Good luck, hatchlings!

Green Sands Beach!

Veteran's Day seemed the ideal day to take the mondo Mauna Loa 4WD car to South Point to visit the famous and off-the-beaten-trail Green Sands Beach. I'll probably never go to a beach in mid-November again in my life.

My weak attempt to keep sand from getting into my wounds. Ultimately, the plan failed.


Green sands! And plenty of tourists. The green sand is weathered olivine from basaltic phenocrysts, and it's heavier than black sand (basalt grains). It is preferentially sieved by the waves and washes up on this beach.

There's me, sitting at the top of the beach, reading Lucretius' On the Nature of the Universe. It's a good read - I recommend it. He has some funky ideas, like that things that are pleasurable to our senses have smooth, round atom shapes while things that are sticky, smelly, or gross have rough and jagged atom shapes. However, some things, like sea water, can have a mix of atom shapes because it is fluid (smooth shapes) but also salty (rough shapes). Trippy....

Another Misadventure, of the Sea Urchin variety

I'm sure most of you are aware of this incident by now, if you've seen the pictures on Facebook that Andy P. posted. I thought that I would tell the story from the trailhead, and I'll also mention that I'm nearly walking normally now and the sea urchin spines are almost gone (I think).

The first photo of the weekend, taken on November 6th. The original plan was to hike 6 miles to Apua Point (the turtle beach that I visited earlier this summer), camp there one night, and then continue through Keauhou beach to camp at Halape beach the second night. We're all excited to start the long, flat trail along the southern coastline.

Apua Point at sunset is a beautiful cove. There was a near-cloudless sky with plenty of dramatic shooting stars.

Along the trail from Apua to Keauhou, Katie and I stopped along the way to check out some potential 'shatter rings' for Katie's supervisor.

We finally made it to Keauhou and found the other members of our group. Keauhou is a pretty nice beach, secluded with nice soft sand. According to some people, it's the best snorkeling spot on the island, so of course I was tempted...Unfortunately, the 'best' spot is where the larger waves are.

Snorkeling with Katie! There were a few cool fish, but we were getting pushed offshore by the waves so decided to head in...

The two bobbing heads on the left are us, and we were heading straight for those rocks on the shore when the waves got rougher and pushed us onto them. I was dragged across a sea urchin and about a dozen spines punctured my foot. I also collected several scrapes on both legs and feet from the rocks. Luckily, we had several first aid kits so we patched it up as best we could.

There wasn't really a feasible way for me to reach Halape, so the options were to hike up the pali, or go back the way we came along the coast. Although the coastal trail was longer, it seemed the better option, so Dave B. was a gentleman and walked out the 9 miles with Katie and I back to the car. When I got back to the house, I soaked my foot in vinegar and hot water, and it looked like this:

Gross, right? I think the purple color comes from the venom or dye that was injected by the spines. It faded after a few days. No worries, I'm walking okay, and I'll probably try to get to Halape again during one of my remaining weekends...

Fieldwork at Mauna Loa summit, Oct 19-21

This was one epic trip, and as our supervisor Frank would say, "The mountain won." Mauna Loa is a formidable beast, especially if the camp stove that worked perfectly at 4500ft fails to light in the bitter cold of 13000ft. That was our first misadventure on the Mountain, but we survived the night without dinner and luckily were able to get another camp stove by hailing a helicopter to fly it up.

Sarah Iki, me, and Mango on the northwest rim of Moku`aweoweo at sunset.

Mauna Kea in the background! Luckily it was clear like this the entire time.

Hualalai in the distance and the sunset.

Lunch the second day tasted delicious with our fancy new (functional) camp stove! When we hailed the helicopter, I was reminded of the opening scene from MASH...

Digging in the dirt! Taking fine-grained samples to look for lithics...Erin looks excited, too.

Erin and I huddling next to the van while cooking dinner to avoid the wind.

Last day! Driving home, we stopped by this dramatic fissure. Lava poured into it from both sides to create a smooth surface.

All photos in this post are the property of the USGS.

The Return of the Lava

I suppose the lava never really left, but I was inspired by the amazing original VHS copy of Star Wars #6 that resides in the USGS dorm...Remember the days of VHS? I do.

In other news, I may have lost my camera at the summit of Mauna Loa from my epic camping trip earlier this week (which will be a post at some point, I promise), so for now I can't post pictures of my weekend adventures. A narrative will have to suffice.

The lava flows on the coast near Kalapana that are fed by Pu`u O`o have been incredibly active this past week, despite a deflation-inflation (DI) event last weekend that threatened to halt the downslope movement of the surface flows.

Earlier in the summer I went with my CSAV class to experience the lava for the first time, which involved an arduous uphill hike over tumuli in the intense heat of the early afternoon. However, last Sunday morning when I went out (with a certified HVO scientist, of course) the hike was an easy 5 minutes to get to the active flows. We mapped the fresh lobes with the GPS, walked over the flow that had cooled the day before, and then collected a few samples for ourselves. The flow was sluggish at the time, but over the next few days it moved about 400m towards the trailhead and the tourist viewing area.


Don't worry, I didn't actually eat my sample. The flows are actually quite a hazard, potentially, because they are encroaching on a forested kipuka and may cause serious forest fires. Also, the tourists might be able to see the flows from the viewing area, so the number of ignorant trespassers will likely triple in the next few days.

Here's Sarah K., Katie, me, and Sarah S. excited about lava!


The HVO scientists are predicting that the lava will actually reach the ocean because the flows are tubed (aka insulated) on the slope of the pali. Therefore, they can travel much greater distances than if they were exposed to the air.

Now, my lovely lava video.




All photos and movie footage are the property of the USGS.

Grad School Blues

It's hard to believe that I'm still in the process of contacting potential advisors and trying to sort out the geologic topics that interest me.

Today I contacted professors from the University of Alaska-Fairbanks for volcanology and geochronology, so hopefully I'll hear back soon. I could see myself really enjoying Alaska, despite the dark winters. Although it's easy to say that now that I'm accustomed to a tropical paradise...

Nature is Cyclic

The last Saturday of September (the 26th) was a pretty spectacular day for Pele and Halema`uma`u, but I got so caught up in other things that I failed to update my captivated readers to let y'all know what was going on.

Here's the deal:
The volcano is constantly uplifting and subsiding - I think of it as breathing - and this motion is reflected in the tilt deformation stations at the summit (and at Pu`u O`o). When there's a distinct change in deformation we define it as a DI (deflation-inflation) event.

On Saturday (the 26th) there was a prolonged and exaggerated DI event where the lava lake level beneath the crust dropped for an unusually long period of time, so much so that the hardened crust was left hanging - literally - and crashed down to the surface of the lava. The collapse produced a robust brown ashy plume, and it was the largest event that has happened since October of last year.

The next cool thing to happen was the cyclic filling and draining of the lava lake that was suddenly and violently exposed to the air and unprotected by a cool crust. The cycle was on the order of a few hours, although in the past it has been as fast as 3 minutes! Click on this link to see the cyclic draining/filling of the lava lake.

On Friday night Katie and I were able to go out to the caldera (with a qualified HVO scientist, of course) to view the lava pond for ourselves. Unfortunately it wasn't quite as exciting as other nights from last week because we caught it during the end of the draining/beginning of the filling state so there was more bad gas than usual and the lake level was lower. I also couldn't get any good pictures because of the lighting. Still, I enjoyed it, as always.

The lake disappeared (aka drained away) on Saturday morning and was gone until Monday morning. Maybe it had something to do with the full moon?

EARTHQUAKE

I just felt an earthquake for the first time! At 05:32 HST, a magnitude 2.7 earthquake occurred 1 km E of Kilauea summit at a depth of 1.6 km, and it shook my bed and rattled our blinds for a second. Enough to wake me up, anyway.

Ok, back to bed.

Update: In my weary blurry-eyed confused state this morning I failed to realize that 1 km E of the summit is approximately under my house. Craziness.

Summit Inflation, Explosive Events: It's Been a Good Week

Last Sunday was marked by an unusual peak of inflation at the Halema`uma`u vent that caused the lava lake level to rise to the point where it was spattering out of the little pukas on the vent floor. The vent floor is about 85 meters below the Kilauea caldera floor, and the surface of the lava (the surface where the gas is released) is about 200 meters below that. So, for scale, the glowing red holes that you see in the picture below are each about 10 meters across, or the size of a city bus (according to my poor estimation skills).

Matt P. took Fred and I out to see the lava (not all of the volunteers could go for safety reasons), so I've posted a picture and I also took a pixelated video from my camera. All photos and video are property of USGS. A much better video is Matt P.'s zoom-in video, where you can see the lava spattering up through the holes. I've posted the link to the right of this entry under the Interesting Links section. Pretty cool, right? Apparently the lava lake level in June was about this high, although the hole was much bigger so you could see the lake sloshing around a lot more.

While we were there we heard a rockfall that lasted about 15 seconds (it seems even longer when you're standing right there) and the red glow intensified, but apparently it was still a pretty small rockfall in comparison to other events.

Speaking of other events, there was a hybrid/VLP event on September 17 at 3:13 am, meaning that there was a large collapse onto the lava surface that caused an explosive event. There's a video posted on the HVO website from the high resolution low-light camera in the HVO tower, but I've posted it here for your convenience:



This event was about 1/5 the size of the October 12, 2008 explosive event that happened during the day where you could see lava above the vent floor level.

In my humble opinion, it's been a very exciting week.

Happy No-Work Day!

It's official - I win the prize for most awkward burn line (or most hilarious burn line, if that's your sense of humor). You can't see the other side of my face, but I pretty much have a stripe of red across my eyes and a glasses-line on the other side. I call it the "raccoon" tan. Or maybe, the "reverse masked hero" tan?

In other news, it's my first celebration of Labor Day, and to honor my first day of not-working on a week day in Hawaii, I baked garlic rosemary bread using Katie Bovee's recipe that she got from someone else. I baked this bread for comps talks last spring, and this batch turned out even better. Now, if I could only find people to eat it...

On Saturday in Hilo we ate breakfast at a great waffle place, then walked all around the farmer's market before taking a few people to the airport. While I was shopping in the stores along the bayfront Fred showed me a place to buy a soprano ukulele, so I did! Today I've been researching ukulele chords and popular songs to play. Is it just me, or do most songs sound better when played on a ukulele?

P.S. Have a great time in Germany, Ben! I miss you!

Journey to the Top of the World's Biggest Mountain

And I didn't have to go to the Himalayas to do it.

If you were to include the depth to the sea floor, Mauna Loa is technically the tallest mountain in the world (and has the largest volume by far). The summit is located at 13,679 ft, and in order to climb to Moku`aweoweo (the caldera) and return in one day, we started at ~11,000 ft and hiked 4 miles up to the caldera. Here's the view of Mauna Kea from the start of our hike on Mauna Loa.

In the Hawaiian language, moku`aweoweo roughly translates to "burning red area," or it could be named after a red big-eyed fish. Who knows.

The trail is marked by stone cairns, called ahu, so every so often we'd take a break. That's Fred in the background.

A cool feature near the big cairn!

This was my favorite part of the trail. The goldish-brownish material is mostly basaltic pumice from a lava fountain during the last Mauna Loa eruption in 1984, but there are also some pumice chunks where the gas bubbles were elongated and the colors were metallic blue, teal-ish, red, blue-green, and orange.

Finally, we got to the caldera! I felt pretty tough, especially considering the high altitude. It took us about 4.5 hours to hike to the caldera, but only 2.5 hours to hike down. Thanks, gravity.

We were pretty tired after lunch...

Here's all of us at the caldera! From the left: Erin, me, Katie, and Fred.

Four Outta Five Ain't Bad

Last Friday was the second trip planned by Jane to get compass directions for a series of pictures after the 2006 earthquake. This time we traveled to Kawaihae, a city north of Kona. One of the sites damaged was the Pu`ukohola heiau (temple). Pu`u means hill, and kohola means humpback whale, so the site is right near the coast where humpback whales congregate from November to May. Hopefully I can come back over here before I leave! This is a picture of the main heiau building that was damaged:

After the second site (the Kawaihae pier, where the main security guard thought we were crazy for wanting compass directions for buildings that were damaged and didn't exist anymore), we stopped at a chicken plate lunch stand near the road and then drove to Hawi. Hawi is the northern-most town in Hawaii, I'm pretty sure, and it's also super artsy-fartsy. It's a small town with a lot of art galleries and overpriced unnecessary things. Still, I liked this sign:


We decided to drive to Pu`u Huluhulu, one of Mauna Kea's old eruptive cones that is now surrounded by Mauna Loa lava flows. This is the view from the top looking towards Mauna Kea, with many more Mauna Kea cones all around and the treacherous Saddle Road in the middle:


On the drive up to the Mauna Kea observatory, I got hungry for some delicious chicken...


Here's the visitor's center right before sunset - we hiked up one of the nearby cones to watch the sun go down.


Here's a view of some cones from the top looking toward Mauna Loa. The cones are so pretty, I think.


And here's the sun, and the third youngest volcano Hualalai is in the distance behind the clouds.

So today we saw four out of five volcanoes, including the oldest, Kohala, in the north on the way back from Hawi.

Just for reference, the volcanoes from youngest to oldest are: Kilauea, Mauna Loa, Hualalai, Mauna Kea, and Kohala.

Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na.....Native!

Here's a little tidbit about Hawaii that they don't tell you in the guidebooks. The popular Hawaiian radio station, called Native FM at 95.9, repeats 5 reggae songs over and over in one day.

The most popular song, which you hear approximately 4 times if you're driving a lot in one day, we HVO volunteers call the "Brothers and Sisters" song. The chorus (the only part we can actually understand) goes like this:

Keep your culture/Bruthas and sistas/Keep your culture/...Polynesia!

The other 4 songs that they repeat aren't quite as redundant and there's even one that isn't reggae, but instead it's quite melodramatic and sappy. Someday I'd like to meet the DJ.

Slow Going

Unfortunately, it seems that Pele is feeling shy as the glow from Halema`uma`u is dimming and occasionally "winks" out of sight altogether. This is one of two reasons for my recent lack of posts (or interesting volcano-related ones, at any rate).

The second reason is that I have been updating the huge HVO abstract database for the past few weeks; therefore I have been spending a ridiculous time in front of a computer, typing noisily on a stubborn keyboard for hours at a time. I'm proud to say that I've logged over 100 abstracts and articles, but it does not encourage fun computer blog-updating time at home.

And, here's a random picture for your entertainment. I love the Lava Lounge (and pau hana!) Sam Nakata, a 2008 Carleton geology grad, is behind Katie and I, and Adam Soule, another Carleton grad (from a while ago - he's Sam's advisor at MIT) is there, too. And Katie's laughing REALLY hard about something...probably our Aloha Friday shirts!


This upcoming weekend includes picking up a new volunteer on Thursday, Kawaihae on Friday to do more compass-direction work for Jane, Hilo on Saturday to drop off the Frenchies, and hiking Mauna Loa on Sunday. Then, finally, my very first celebration of Labor Day (aka a day off) on Monday!

Post-HVO Plans

I took a rest day today to relax, sleep in, clean the house, and start my graduate school application statement of purpose essays. Right now I'm considering three schools for a Master's degree: Oregon State University, where I'd work with my advisor from last summer and continue my senior thesis project (a Marine Geology degree in the Oceanography department), and either the University of Oregon or the University of Hawaii-Manoa grad programs, where I'd be working toward a Physical Volcanology degree.

This is pretty exciting, because I remember in Jr. High I was really interested in Oceanography and Volcanology, so it's nice to actually realize that dream. Then again, I also wanted to be the first female President...

All three applications are due at the beginning of January, so I have to apply while I'm still volunteering. I'm not too stressed right now because I think I have a pretty good head start on the process, but the time passes so quickly here. If anyone has advice about the grad school application process, I'd love to hear it!

Richardson's Beach

We took last Sunday to get groceries in Hilo and use the government car to get to Richardson's beach - one of the best beaches in Hilo (doesn't compare to Kona beaches, but it'll do). We played Hana fuda while sitting in the sand, and Katie and I lost 6 times in a row against Reid, Fred, Kevin, and David. I still haven't won a game - there's not even a strategy involved! It's supposed to be just luck!

I spent some time trying to pick out the pretty green olivine crystals, but laying down in the gravelly-sand is not the best idea:

The exciting part of the day was seeing this turtle swim its way through a channel to the open water. I love turtles!



After the beach we went to see Public Enemies at the $1 theater in Hilo. My next plan: buy a ukulele in Hilo sometime...

The Lu`au Aftermath

The lu`au was a tremendous success. The temperature in the imu was measured at 194 degrees using a thermocouple (the tool that you use to probe lava), and a pig is supposed to be sanitary at 170 degrees. It was the MOST delicious pulled pork I've ever tasted. Here's me between the pig under the tarp and the sheep on the spit (I really liked that hat):

Once the pig came out, a friend of Jack Lockwood's used the shoulder bone to mash the meat and the fat together in order to maximize the flavor. I was surprised that the pig came out falling apart, but it smelled really good!

Here's Katie and I sampling Frank's infamous homemade beer - the best homebrew ever!

It was raining on and off all day, so Loren, Kevin, the drummer named Jeremy, and Reid jammed out under the tent.

And we got to take a huge plate of food home, which we're still working through.

A Bona Fide Lu`au

I can now add to the number of eccentric older famous geologist celebrities that I've met. Yesterday, Jack Lockwood (a friend of Walter Alvarez, so Jack was excited to meet other Carleton graduates) invited us volunteers to a special lu`au celebrating the release of his new volcanology textbook, as long as we helped dig the imu oven and prepare the pig. It seemed like a once-in-a-lifetime experience, so most of us jumped at the opportunity. This wasn't some fake lu`au organized for tourists where they aren't allowed to give the tourists the roasted pig meat and there are hula dancers everywhere. This is bona fide.

We drove out to rural Volcano to a huge, sprawling and messy farm where they killed the pig (I set up the tables so I didn't have to watch the slaughter and become a vegetarian) and we helped to set up the oven. It was basically a big pit under a tin shack where we piled `ohi`a tree wood high and covered it with stones. I didn't post any graphic pictures of the pig.

These are the materials - a pit, rocks, banana stumps, tea leaves, `ohi`a wood, and dirt.


Here's Katie and the pit pre-wood...


We piled the kindling on, but apparently it wasn't enough for the giant pig, so we had to take all of the rocks and larger pieces of wood off and start again. This time we did Pele proud. I've also learned that volcanologists tend to be pyromaniacs.


We were at the farm from 10-3 for this stage of the process. At 6 pm they lit the fire, and we returned at midnight to help put the pig on the rocks. We definitely earned our invitation!

At midnight we smashed the banana stumps to cover the glowing rocks (the wood had all burned away), and we carried the 100-lb pig to the pit using hooks thrust through the lower legs. Frank (an HVO geologist who was in charge of the whole process) cut pockets in the shoulders and rump of the pig, and we put thin round glowing rocks inside the pockets and belly to facilitate the cooking. The entire pig was smoking, but it didn't really smell like bacon.

The final stages included covering the remaining glowing rocks with the squashed banana stumps, wrapping the pig in tin foil and wire like a giant hot pocket, and covering the pig with banana leaves, tea leaves, wet burlap sacks, a tarp, and finally piling dirt back on top. It was extremely smoky due to the rocks in the pig as well as the burning wood.

We'll see how it turned out soon! We start eating the pig at 2 pm. I'll post more pictures and let you know how it went later today.