When, not If lava crosses 130...

[Wao nahele kane]

It certainly has been relatively quiet along the coast (helicopter wise) since the ocean entry stopped. I do like that.

[csgray]

Damon Tucker has a video posted on his blog that shows the crater floor dropping out of Pu'u O'o early in the morning of March 5th. It dropped 115 meters in a fairly short time. This probably renders this whole discussion moot for a good long while.

Carol

edited to add that I cannot find any reference to that collapse on the HVO website, so I wonder if Damon is posting an old video with a recent date instead of the correct one.

[mac nut]

It is in that tube headed to your back yard carol!

[csgray]

Not us, but maybe the place we where we lived in Orchidland a few years ago. After an earthquake there was a big rainstorm and a lava tube just started pumping water at a higher velocity than a fire hydrant. All of Hawaiian acres was draining right into our ground floor apartment.

Carol

[Obie]

quote:

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Originally posted by csgray

Damon Tucker has a video posted on his blog that shows the crater floor dropping out of Pu'u O'o early in the morning of March 5th. It dropped 115 meters in a fairly short time. This probably renders this whole discussion moot for a good long while.

Carol

edited to add that I cannot find any reference to that collapse on the HVO website, so I wonder if Damon is posting an old video with a recent date instead of the correct one.

---

That video is actually from 2011 !

[Super8]

quote:

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Originally posted by Chunkster

Two reasons have been given for the county's lack of interest in lava diversion. One is the liability for damages wherever the diverted lava ends up. The other is the anticipated opposition from Native Hawaiians on cultural and religious grounds. FWIW, the Italians have had some success with diversion on Mt. Aetna, and I would rate their organizational abilities and government efficiency on a rough par with Hawaii.

---

That's a damn shame. Diverting the flow and containing it to the South- Southeast would be a relatively simple, easily manageable undertaking. It could give between 50-70 people a job for awhile, while only a very few of them would have to be technically skilled. Can you run a rock drill? Can you do some basic math? a few heavy equipment operators, a couple of truck drivers, a good engineer, a bright geologist, mostly manual laborers and the county could have it's cake and eat it, too. You'd have the a safe lava viewing area, Royal gardens could be reclaimed, folks might be able to get some insurance breaks... it'd be a win/win for everybody. Why would native Hawaiians have a problem with which direction the lava flows?

Looks like there's an undersea trough between the Loihi and Hohonu seamounts that would be a perfect receptacle for all that lava. Might even help stabilize the Hilina Slump.

As far as the government having to deal with the fall out from damage and liability, there wouldn't be a better use of eminent domain. There, property is currently already "destroyed." You could effectively control where lava deltas form and where they end up when they break off. If the county does nothing, and the USGS simulation proves true, they have consigned 10,000+ people to losing their homes. The government is supposed to protect property, right?

[unknownjulie]

If people protest a telescope being built on a volcano, what kind of protest will happen if someone proposes blowing a hole in the side of a volcano? I can only imagine!

[unknownjulie]

The lava front is 7.7 kilometers from the cone, and it was 7.8 km when it last stalled. In other words, if the lava keeps flowing it will soon move past the old boundary. It appears to still be spreading. This was info from a satelite photo from the 2nd.

[kalakoa]

County already disavows any and all perceived liability from those "private" subdivisions, so I can't imagine that the lava flow will be treated any differently.

[bluesboy]

It's the same everywhere - people want to change the course of Mother Nature. And the answer is always the same - you can't.

Go with the flow.