LAVA FLOWING
Hawaii volcano update: Kilauea erupts spewing lava after ‘increased earthquake activity’
A VOLCANO in Hawaii started spewing lava for the first time in months after “increased earthquake activity” was detected.
Officials at the US Geological Survey noticed glows emerging from Kilauea's Halemaumau crater on Wednesday afternoon.
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Kilauea is located within Volcanoes National Park on the state's Big Island.
Footage shows lava fountains covering the floor as plumes of volcanic gas rose into the air.
Experts say that the eruption is being contained within the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and will not affect homes.
The volcano's alert level was raised to "warning" after officials detected increased earthquake activity and ground swelling.
The USGS’ observatory webcams detected a glow emerging from the summit’s crater at about 3:20pm local time Wednesday.
Officials upgraded the aviation code from orange to red as potential hazards such as toxic gases and falling rocks were evaluated.
The color code implies that a hazardous eruption is “imminent, underway or suspected,” according to the USGS website.
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Gases such as water vapor, carbon dioxide, and sulfur dioxide are released during eruptions of Kilauea.
Sulfur dioxide can create volcanic smog which poses a potential risk to Americans and can affect crops and livestock.
The USGS tweeted: “A line of low lava fountains is erupting from the crater floor, tephra is falling downwind, and a new fissure opened up the west wall of Halema’uma’u crater.”
David Phillips, of the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory, told : “Just after midnight, we started to get some increase in earthquake activity and seismic swarms.”
He warned that the eruption could last for months.
It comes just months after the volcano’s latest eruption which started in December and continued until May.
'HAZARDOUS ERUPTION'
Ken Hon, of the Hawaii Volcano Observatory, said these types of eruptions could happen for years as the volcano fills up with magma.
He told the: “We do know that one thing that happens is that the magma keeps coming into Kilauea at a pretty constant rate and so it’s either filling the inside of the volcano and repressurize it or it’s coming out to the surface.”
The sent a dangerous ash cloud 30,000 feet into the sky.
It followed a series of earthquakes, including a 4.4 magnitude tremor.
More than 700 homes were destroyed and thousands of residents were displaced after a major eruption in 2018.
The volcano had been slowly erupting for decades but didn't really affect Hawaiians in densely populated areas.
Streams of lava occasionally covered rural farms and homes and, on some occasions, it reached the ocean.
In 2018, Kilauea spewed enough lava to fill 320,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
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It buried an area more than half the size of Manhattan in up to 80 feet of now-hardened lava.
Landmarks and neighborhoods were turned into a field of boulders and volcanic shards.
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