01-23-2019, 02:24 PM
From: https://www.civilbeat.org/2019/01/big-is...tion-zone/
Big Island: New Steam Cracks Plague Residents In Eruption Zone
The latest volcanic eruption episode in Lower Puna officially ended about four months ago, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency stopped accepting new registrations for eruption-related disaster aid back on Sept. 12.
But on Ala Ili Road, above Leilani Estates in Puna, steaming cracks are still opening up under people’s houses. Trees are dying, cooked from the roots up.
The cracks have forced neighborhood residents to leave at least three homes so far, and several more are threatened.
Beverly Vance moved out Jan. 13 after temperatures under her house rose to 144 degrees Fahrenheit and steam began spouting out the air pipe of her cesspool.
It’s her second evacuation. Last May, a huge steam vent opened in a meadow behind her house. A scientist from the Hawaii Volcano Observatory investigated, and found ground temperatures near the boiling point of water.
“I asked her how long I should be here,” Vance said. “She said, ‘Leave within the hour.’”
She and her three dogs lived for a while in her car, then went to stay with her daughters in Oregon before returning in August, about the time the lava flow ended.
But since then, cracks have spread from the original steam vent, creeping through the forest and onto her neighbors’ properties, and the temperatures in those cracks have been rising.
On Jan. 5, she noticed steam rising around a tangerine tree in her yard. She measured the temperature around its base at 119.3 degrees.
A week later, the temperature beneath the tree was 148 degrees. As of Thursday, it was 160...
Full story at link above...
Big Island: New Steam Cracks Plague Residents In Eruption Zone
The latest volcanic eruption episode in Lower Puna officially ended about four months ago, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency stopped accepting new registrations for eruption-related disaster aid back on Sept. 12.
But on Ala Ili Road, above Leilani Estates in Puna, steaming cracks are still opening up under people’s houses. Trees are dying, cooked from the roots up.
The cracks have forced neighborhood residents to leave at least three homes so far, and several more are threatened.
Beverly Vance moved out Jan. 13 after temperatures under her house rose to 144 degrees Fahrenheit and steam began spouting out the air pipe of her cesspool.
It’s her second evacuation. Last May, a huge steam vent opened in a meadow behind her house. A scientist from the Hawaii Volcano Observatory investigated, and found ground temperatures near the boiling point of water.
“I asked her how long I should be here,” Vance said. “She said, ‘Leave within the hour.’”
She and her three dogs lived for a while in her car, then went to stay with her daughters in Oregon before returning in August, about the time the lava flow ended.
But since then, cracks have spread from the original steam vent, creeping through the forest and onto her neighbors’ properties, and the temperatures in those cracks have been rising.
On Jan. 5, she noticed steam rising around a tangerine tree in her yard. She measured the temperature around its base at 119.3 degrees.
A week later, the temperature beneath the tree was 148 degrees. As of Thursday, it was 160...
Full story at link above...