Current Lava Flow Pictures - Kilauea Volcano

Well, Flossie was a dud - thank goodness. It was a little weird watching the CNN anchor guy go on and on about how 'the Big Island is being hammered by Hurricane Flossie' and then to look out the window and see no rain or wind at all. LOL. Those news guys just plain LIE to make things exciting.

The volcano is still quite exciting and a little scary though - a visitor did a helicopter flyover on August 24th and sent me these pictures. Thanks!

The thread "Volcano acting up" at Punaweb.org is a fascinating discussion between several people who all seem to have some degree of concern that the volcano *is* a threat to their homes and property in the near future. The concern is that if the lava continues on its current course it will hit Pahoa and cover highway 130, the only egress out of lower Puna. The current volcano expert being quoted in the paper says that the topography of the land makes it unlikely the lava will go that way, and that in the past it has taken lava years to travel that distance (4 to 6 miles to Pahoa I think) - both of which seem like pretty good arguments.

However, these are some pretty populated areas these days, and people are nervous .. especially people who are fresh off the boat :) who haven't been through this before.

The county has made a new website: http://www.lavainfo.us/ to keep us all informed on a minute to minute basis.

Poster glennoid at the forum I linked to above created this overlay of the current lava flow map on a Google earth map to give a fascinating idea of just where exactly this current flow is on the Big Island. The white square in the upper left is a map of the lava flow, and the red stuff is the most recent lava. All those green areas dotted with clouds are populated - houses and small towns and parks and thousands of families.