Kilauea Volcano Erupts

Kilauea is a Hawaiian word that means "spewing" or "much spreading", referring to its frequent outpouring of lava. The Kilauea volcano is between 210,000 and 280,000 years old and grew above sea level about 100,000 years ago. The most recent eruption occurred on June 3, 2024, along fissures that opened on the volcano's southwest rift zone. Between 2008 and 2018, Halemaʻumaʻu, a pit crater located within Kīlauea's summit caldera, hosted an active lava lake. Kīlauea erupted nearly continuously from vents on the eastern rift zone between January 1983 and April 2018 destroying the towns of Kalapana and Kaimū along with the community's renowned in 1990.

In May 2018, activity shifted further down rift of the Puna district, during which lava erupted from two dozen vents with eruptive fountains that sent rivers of lava into the ocean in three places. The eruption destroyed Hawaii's largest natural freshwater lake, covered substantial portions of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens, and destroyed the communities of Kapoho, Vacationland Hawaii, and most of the Kapoho Beach Lots, during which lava erupted from two dozen vents with eruptive fountains that sent rivers of lava into the ocean in three places.