This ominous red substance is molten lava from the Pu'u 'Ō'ō vent on the Kīlauea Volcano in Hawaii, exposed by a "skylight" in the roof of a developing lava tube. This one reveals an active lava stream that is travelling to the upper right.
"Skylights are extremely dangerous to approach from the ground," says Christina Neal, scientist-in-charge at the United States Geological Survey's (USGS) Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. A USGS geologist took this photo from a helicopter on one of the team's routine monitoring missions.
Kīlauea is considered one of the world's most active volcanoes. "This eruption has been going on nearly continuously since January 3, 1983," says Neal. Since then, lava flows from the Pu'u 'Ō'ō vent have added about 200 hectares of new land to the island of Hawaii; the lava flow in this photo has already reached the ocean, 11 kilometres away.
Since May, Neal's team has been using forward-looking infrared imagery to create sequences of thermal maps along the lava flow's length, which they translate into precise thermal fluxes. With these calculations, the team is developing better lava flow forecasts, which helps the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, local emergency managers and Hawaii Civil Defense officials understand what is happening, how much lava is flowing, and where it is going.
And that's useful for deciding when to issue warnings about the volcano's potentially red-hot hazards.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
