Big Island Lava Flow

The lava flow a few miles down the road has stalled and is getting wider, little by little. I'm not anticipating that the lava will cross the main highway, but if it does....I give this part of the Island about 3-5 years and it will be covered in about 60-70' of lava. This part of old Hawaii will be gone.

As it stands, the 'vog' from the lava flow is pretty nasty. Not that you can always see the smoke, etc in the air where we live, but you can feel it. The particulates in the air can be deadly. Right now it is making most of us very, very fatigued. If it does continue, I will have to leave the island before the rest of the gang.

The vog is deadly to those of us with heart disease and I can attest to that 100%. Always fatigued, drowsy, short of breath, chest pain....dang. Looks like our stay on the Big Island is drawing to a close sooner than we thought.

Went up to 'the dump', which is the transfer station in Pahoa. The transfer station is where you take your trash that is then toted off of the island and disposed of....Honolulu, I think.

The lens used was a Canon 100-400mm IS L I mounted on a Canon 5DII. The shots are handheld thanks to one of my tripod legs being gummed up with marble dust. Need to fix that today.

The shots are behind the leading edge of the stalled flow. The lava continues to flow underneath the hardened crust, building up higher and higher. In the old flows from Kalapana and Kapoho, the lava is 60-70' thick in areas. Again, if this continues, this is what this entire Puna District will look like in a few years.

The images are not meant to be award winning, just informative.

You can see how it builds higher and higher.

That's lnsane. Do you have any more pictures?

Nice documentation, thanks for posting.

That looks terrible, sorry for you Hawaiians

I'll be capturing images every day and will post updates in this thread.

The flow is very slow moving, which is a good thing, and it may just stop completely, which is a better thing. If not, it will continue for many miles until it reaches the ocean. After that, if it did continue, it would widen out until it engulfed this part of the Island. That is the worse case scenario.

In the meantime, I'll be documenting as much of this part of 'Old Hawaii' as I can. Just in case.

Thanks gang.

A friend of mine said that the lava reminded him of bodies. I thought the same thing when I was shooting.

Another view.

Thanks for sharing. One of my favorite vacations included going to the Big Island to watch the lava flow into the sea before dawn. It's sobering to remember this the fate of everything; it just happens faster there.

You are welcome. Yes, if the flow continues and comes over the 'ridge', this entire portion of the island will be covered with lava within the next 3-5 years. Then again, it could stop tomorrow.

Thanks for sharing, looks beautiful!

Ron Bailey wrote in post #17358499
A friend of mine said that the lava reminded him of bodies. I thought the same thing when I was shooting.

I love this as an abstract.

My photography mentor has been to Hawaii many times and told me a story about lava. I dont remember which island it was on (I never been to HI) but he said there was a town in the mountains and most of it was taken by lava and only a few blocks of town remained. Everyone evacuated and left except for one eccentric guy who lives there by himself. He has an old Ford Pinto and once a year he goes out of town to get more fuel & supplies.

With lava in the arsenal of Mother Nature there is not much can be done in some places. It's a matter of time but it will eventually creep up to you.

dkizzle wrote in post #17361818
I love this as an abstract.

My photography mentor has been to Hawaii many times and told me a story about lava. I dont remember which island it was on (I never been to HI) but he said there was a town in the mountains and most of it was taken by lava and only a few blocks of town remained. Everyone evacuated and left except for one eccentric guy who lives there by himself. He has an old Ford Pinto and once a year he goes out of town to get more fuel & supplies.

With lava in the arsenal of Mother Nature there is not much can be done in some places. It's a matter of time but it will eventually creep up to you.

The neighborhood you refer to is on the big island. While there a couple years or so ago I took a helicopter tour of the area and flew over this site. You can still see some remnants of the streets and the one remaining house with solidified lava flow surrounding it. No power or water any longer and it is correct that the person(s) that still live there hike out when needed to their car and drive to town (Hilo) for supplies. I highly recommend that anyone going to the big island consider a helicopter tour of the area. Very interesting and beautiful.

These are amazing images. My first thought was also of "seeing" images of people in the lava. The first one being right next to the sign! There's no controlling Mother Nature, that's for certain.

Thanks gang, much appreciated.

The fellow who lived in the last house was burned out over a year ago. The lava finally caught up with and he had to escape by helicopter. The area is Royal Gardens, which you can see in the graphic in this post. We live in Leilani and are 'safe' for now.

The ridge I spoke about can be seen as the very red line in the lava flow. It is actually a large fissure that has opened up and is on the other side of the ridge.

I've also include a link to the Hawaii Civil Defense page in case anyone wanted to follow the flow, etc.

http://www.hawaiicount​y.gov/active-alerts/