+- Punaweb Forum (http://punaweb.org/forum)
+-- Forum: Punaweb Forums (http://punaweb.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=3)
+--- Forum: Punatalk (http://punaweb.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=10)
+--- Thread: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? (/showthread.php?tid=19580)
Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - MarkD - 05-17-2018
Data from April 28, 2018 article:
HVNP details visitation numbers
"A new National Park Service report shows that 2,016,702 visitors to Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park in 2017 spent $166 million in communities near the park. That spending supported 2,020 jobs in the local area, and had a cumulative benefit to the local economy of $222,394,900."
That's more than 5,000 park visitors a day.
http://www.bigislandvideonews.com/2018/04/28/hawaii-volcanoes-national-park-details-visitation-numbers
From another source: "An eruption at Kilauea in 1924 killed one person and sent rocks, ash and dust into the air for 17 days."
Is 17 days considered an average duration for such an event? Or could this go on for months? And what is likelihood that park closure would be necessary all or part of the time?
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - Obie - 05-17-2018
The eruption started in 1983 and has continued since.It has changed a lot but is ongoing.
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - glassnumbers - 05-17-2018
Maybe they could figure out a way to do an Extreme Lava Survival Challenge, where people pay and sign a waiver to do an Extreme Lava Tour with oxygen tanks and goggles and stuff. I mean, people jump out of airplanes for fun, I can see an Extreme Lava Tour being a thing.
Aloha
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - Eric1600 - 05-17-2018
MarkD, the current eruption is by far the longest ever recorded: on-going since Jan. 3, 1983. In 1924 that was a caldera only eruption and the longest caldera only eruption is about 294 days. We are seeing both rift and caldera eruptions now, but the ash clouds, etc. are a byproduct of the drop in lava levels which has something to do with the current rift eruption. No one knows where all the lava went or what the near future holds.
https://www.soest.hawaii.edu/GG/HCV/kil-hist.html
There's a number of possibilities according to USGS but for the most part they have been good at predicting the processes but have not tried to predict the future. https://www.usgs.gov/news/k-lauea-volcano-erupts
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - MarkD - 05-17-2018
Thanks, but maybe I'm missing something here. The eruption since 1983 is Pu'u O'o, sited off some distance. It causes vog, but has been mostly tolerable in other respects.
Pu'u O'o has been a big visitor attraction by air.
Now we have 2 other things: Lava break out at Leilani and closure of HVNP because of activity at Kilauea crater. Each of the sites is a considerable distance from the others.
The combined economic impacts of these two, if they carry on for any length of time, would seem to be devastating for large number of people in East Hawaii. Comments?
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - HereOnThePrimalEdge - 05-17-2018
The eruption since 1983 is Pu'u O'o... has been mostly tolerable in other respects.
Except if you lived in Kalapana, Royal Gardens, swam in Kaimu Black Sand Beach, Queen's Bath...
Portion of Hawaii’s drinking water that comes from underground wells : 9/10
Gallons of raw sewage that leak into the ground from Hawaii cesspools each day : 53,000,000 - Harper's Index
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - MarkD - 05-17-2018
True, I should have cited that. (my bad) But that episode hardly slowed the pace of Puna growth the past 25 years.
The scale of what we are seeing now, should it continue.....
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - Eric1600 - 05-17-2018
Has everyone forgotten Pahoa flow already?
"...episode hardly slowed the pace of Puna growth the past 25 years" Well Puna has been growing quite well since 1983 and now is getting bigger on the eastern rift.
(Please read the links I posted above.) We really have "three things": Halema'uma'u gas eruptions, Pu'u O'o venting gas and east rift venting lava. It's all part of the same hotspot on the seafloor an is the what created all of Hawai'i with Kilauea being the latest to reach above the sea. Currently Loihi Seamount is thought to be the next Hawaiian island. Perhaps it is growing more now but I don't think it is being monitored.
https://geology.com/usgs/loihi-seamount/
https://www.soest.hawaii.edu/GG/HCV/loihi.html
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - MarkD - 05-17-2018
OK, I'm getting educated here. What is different here from Kalapana and Pahoa flows is:
1) HVNP closure, and
2) Widespread fumes around lower Puna that are affecting health and killing vegetation. An Opihikao farmer reported on TV last night that all vegetable crops are dead and 25-30 year old trees are beginning to die.
Seems that some people quite distant from any flow hazard are beginning to conclude that normal life might not be sustainable....
RE: Duration of Kilauea event? Economic impacts? - HereOnThePrimalEdge - 05-17-2018
that episode hardly slowed the pace of Puna growth the past 25 years.
Real estate sales in Hawaii have been affected short term by many natural disasters; Big Island with the lava flows, Kauai with Iniki and the recent floods. There is a drop in real estate sales for a year or two but if the general economy is good, home and land purchases begin again because as humans, we have a very short term memory for those kinds of events. We think in terms of a human lifetime (or less), not geologic time.
Sometimes it may take even a little longer, 10 or 20 years (a long time to a human), like the new construction near the former Royal Gardens in Kalapana. But we're risk takers. Lava flow? That won't happen to me. That can't happen to me.
Portion of Hawaii’s drinking water that comes from underground wells : 9/10
Gallons of raw sewage that leak into the ground from Hawaii cesspools each day : 53,000,000 - Harper's Index