Life Under the Volcano : Hawaii Subdivision Dwellers Are in Fourth Year of Dodging Lava

On what was once a verdant hillside sloping down to the Pacific Ocean, white smoke climbs from a rumpled volcanic pyramid of black and steaming rock.

Cooling lava flows fan out in an apron of destruction that covers several square miles. On a hump of high ground, a lean-to with a corrugated roof provides makeshift shelter for geologists.

The next nearest sign of human activity is several miles south, on a hillside streaked with dark lava, where a small community carries on a cherished but threatened rural life.

Kilauea Volcano, on the largest of the Hawaiian islands, began its current eruption three years ago this week. It has been a boon to scientists and has brought thrills to tourists and uncertainty to islanders who live near a volcanic rift zone, a line of geologic fractures where volcanic activity has taken place.

Unlike the explosive eruptions of Mt. St. Helen’s in Washington state and Nevada del Ruiz in Colombia, no deaths have been blamed on Kilauea in its most recent eruption. Kilauea is a shield volcano that releases pressure gradually.

Skyward Shots of Molten Lava

Activity on Kilauea has come in relatively short bursts, called phases, that last from several hours to several days and are separated by days or weeks of inactivity. During most phases, molten lava shoots skyward, sometimes to 1,000 feet and higher.

The flows have caused nearly $5 million in property damage and numerous evacuations from a downslope neighborhood known as Royal Gardens Subdivision, about 25 miles southwest of Hilo.

“Anybody that has any common sense won’t get in trouble,” says Jack Thompson, who built his house in Royal Gardens. “On the mainland, people get flooded out. It’s not like we have a unique corner on the disaster market.”

At different times, lava has cut off an access road to his house on one side, and has flowed near the house on the other side. Uphill, a lava flow stopped near his backyard.

So far, Thompson says, the lava has moved slowly enough to enable him and his wife to evacuate.

Nonetheless, managing advance warnings to residents has become more difficult as the phases of eruption have become more frequent.

In earlier phases, the lava could take several days to cross acres of vegetation and reach the subdivision, about five miles away. Now, much of the land between the vent and the subdivision is under a lava highway, so new, fast-moving flows can reach the houses within hours.

The Hawaii County Civil Defense activates its emergency control center whenever the volcano erupts, and it keeps residents advised by CB radio. Residents are also asked to keep a light burning at night, in case of a night evacuation.

Since the eruption began, civil defense administrator Harry Kim has overseen numerous evacuations and monitored more than 40 phases of the eruption. He says the number of families in the subdivision, which is a popular tourist attraction, has dropped from 100 to about 60. Lava has destroyed 22 of the houses.

“Some people automatically evacuate. When she erupts, they leave for the night. Why take that chance?” Kim says. “There have been people who just stay up all night, keep each other company. Other people in the area go to sleep, because they are aware we will, hopefully, warn them in time.”

Thompson’s biggest worry is the termination of an insurance policy on his house. The company won’t renew, and others aren’t interested, he says.

Kim says inability to get insurance is a common problem in the island’s vast Puna area, where subdivisions without water or electricity were built in the ‘60s and ‘70s.

Land developers speculated that Puna would become a major tourist spot on the island of Hawaii. Kim says that the subdivisions were approved and lots were sold with little or no disclosure of the potential risks.

“We can drive through Puna, and I can show you areas that have received lava in the 1800s, 1700s and 1600s. That’s what we’re going through again now,” he says.

“The hazards were always there. It was because we developed there that we have changed the hazards into disasters.”

The current eruption of Kilauea began along an intermittent, eight-kilometer chain in the volcano’s east rift zone on Jan. 3, 1983. Some lava fountains were reported leaping to 200 feet high. The activity followed several subsurface earthquakes recorded by geologists.

In later months, the activity settled on what is now called the Pu’u O vent, about a mile west of the 1977 eruption site and about 12 miles from Kilauea’s summit crater. A cone of congealed lava over the Pu’u O vent grew bigger after each phase. It now stands about 820 feet high.

On March 30, 1984, Kilauea’s big sister, Mauna Loa Volcano, erupted and sent a 16-mile-long river of lava toward Hilo, the state’s second largest city (population 40,000).

Night Sky Turns Orange

The flow looked like an advancing forest fire. It turned the night sky orange as it slowly crept toward the city. Police prepared contingency plans in case the city should be cut in half. The flow stopped about four miles from developed property on Hilo’s outskirts.

“To the extent that we can make an accurate forecast of the eruption, it means that we really do know something pretty fundamental about the system,” said Dr. Thomas Wright, head of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. “Each time we’re wrong, we learn important things scientifically.

“We can give the hazard information to Civil Defense that . . . can ensure that there be no loss of life. Property loss, to some extent, is dependent upon where things are built.”

To the residents of Royal Gardens, the short episodes are mere interruptions in a life style of tranquility.

“I just love it. It’s peaceful and unique,” says Olympus Israel, whose house was one of those destroyed. Now, he house-sits for others in the subdivision. “You can’t expect man to beat all odds,” he says, “but we are.”