Sunday, February 24, 2019, Down there on the LERZ in Puna ma kai

The best laid plans, tra la la...

This year of the Earth Pig is, so far, a busy one.  We see masses of blooms on many trees:  mango and summer pea (ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi: peh-uh, for "pear" aka avocado), jacaranda in Kona ʻĀkau,  the startling gold trees in Hilo, previously mentioned bright orange African tulips in windward gulches, etc etc etc.

If you recall, last time I mentioned our drought.  So much for "midst".  Soon thereafter we had seven or so inches of rain up here, and rains over Hawaiʻi nei have continued.  Yesterday, driving home from Hōlualoa on Māmalahoa, the "ma uka road" from Kailua to Waimea, I wondered at the fog and low clouds caught in ʻōhiʻa and lama near the Scenic Point on the 1800 flow.  Different...

Different and equally amazing I think, is the map released by USGS HVO folks a few days ago:

2018 LERZ Flow Thickness Map

The imagery helps put in context the mindbending awesomeness of the prodigious work of Pelehonuamea.  Nine HUNDRED feet thick!  And of course she was able to do that because flows entered the ocean.

Volume of collapse at Kaluapele and pele erupted in Keahialaka are estimated at .8 cubic kilometers each, more or less.  In perhaps more familiar terms, 1,046,360,480 cubic yards.

Thatʻs a Billion + cubic yards.  

And I must say something (again) about reopening roadways in the region.  The Lava Hazard Zone has not changed because the eruption ended.  The area is still in Hazard Zones 1 and 2, the most hazardous.  

There are people whose homes and farms remain lavalocked.  Two sections of Hwy 132 are buried:  about 1.5 miles closest to the "Y" near Lava Tree State Park, and about 1.6 miles as it passes Waiapele (Kapoho Crater).  Total buried is about 3 miles.

Iʻve spent far too much time during the last several weeks talking to folks in our County Government.  People who work for us.  People in the Mayorʻs office, an informal hallway chat with the Mayor, Council people, the staff of Council people, Public Works people, construction people, geologists, Planning Department people, Department of Research and Development people...lots of people.  I wanted to know why hasnʻt work started on even a basic, temporary, gravel road to allow access for residents.

It all boils down to "Harry Said Gotta Wait Six Months".  Again, there is absolutely no physical basis, fact, or reason that a temporary route(s) canʻt be opened.  The eruption is over.  The "Six Month" claim, as explained by the Mayor to me, is because in 1990, when lava was inundating Kalapana, HVO scientists told him to "Wait Six Months" before repaving streets and roadways.  Of course back then Kīlauea was still erupting.  And erupted for another 28 years.  Why repave or fix, when pele may well come again? 

The eruption is over, and has been since September.  There is no reason or need to wait six months.

But still might be hot, but might get lava tubes, but get big cracks, but stay dangerous, but gotta make LIDAR, but gotta bore holes, but gotta survey, but gotta reach consensus, but gotta make Section 106 compliance, but you donʻt understand, but but but....

And meantime, residents are in limbo, not knowing when.

TryLook:

A tidy new road from the "Y" to the Puna Geothermal Venture property.  Up over the levee, across large māwae (fissures or cracks), across the bed of the channel, up the other bank, and home.  Didnʻt hear of any incidents of bulldozers falling into holes or sinking into hot lava, or....nothing.  They made the road.  And this is just ma kai of Fissure 8.

And The County made road over three fingers of pele to allow access to Pohoiki.  That road opened on December 6, 2018:

Someone in a position to know said Oh.  Easy.  Can do ʻum right now.  Money isnʻt an issue, hazards arenʻt issues, we just GPS the route and go.

Why we gotta wait?  Oh.  Gotta meet.  Gotta talk to stake holders.  Gotta gotta gotta.

If someone in the County would only issue a bulletpoint statement saying clearly and succinctly WHY gotta wait, Iʻm open to learning.  But it seems that all this is the usual governmental bureaucratic shibai.  Itʻs so much easier to say No.  No can.  Gotta meet.  Gotta wait.  No.  Nope.  ʻAʻole.  My head like explode...  They seem to forget, as do we sometimes, that They Work for Us.  

From our friend Mick Kalber:  TryLook new roads made by residents:

New Roads on Lava

S  I  G  H......

OK then...Stuff to do, life to live...

As always, with aloha,

BobbyC
maniniowali@gmail.com

Monday, February 18, 2019. Catching up (perhaps)...

And here we be, in the midst of our El Nino drought.  Though if "midst" means middleish, how do we know?  According to my not entirely accurate rain gauge, weʻve had just a couple inches of rain so far this year.  Here at the uppermost reaches of Keaʻau, we hear water trucks pass by the house, on their way to water homes in need.  During my nearly 34 years in Volcano, my 3,500 gallon tank, at the lowest, was a quarter full.  That after three months of zero rain.  Sources say that "moisture from the south" is on its way this evening.  We shall see.

And all our blooming plants will be grateful for the moisture too.  When theyʻre used to 100+ inches of rain a year and they have to subsist on heavy dew, they arenʻt happy.  "Spring" on windward Hawaiʻi means mango trees flush with big heavy clusters of flowers, African tulips setting windward gulches ablaze with orangeness, and lehua bloom too, though not as abundantly, perhaps wanting to be fed by rain first.  And we await hāpuʻu and other ferns unfurling their pepeʻe, their coiled fiddleheads.  The understory of our rainforest turns a vibrant lightgreen when fronds are fresh, quivering in the faintest breeze.  Stay tuned for a photo or two at the appropriate time.  

For now, above is an accidental photo.  Right place, right time, etc.  Itʻs a Western yellowjacket, Vespula pensylvanica, on its way to get nectar from lehua.  Vespula are a nasty nasty invasive species, with mean stings.  And they build big nests in the ground. And they happen to take nectar that otherwise would be eaten by our own endemic yellow-faced bees and birds:  ʻapapane, ʻamakihi, etc...  Trying hard not to rant here...

Whatʻs been odd of late is that weʻve seen none of the stormy weathers that visited much of the rest of our state.  It seems that our place here at the southeast extreme of the chain has been protected by The Mountains.  All weʻve seen for the most part is a tiny bit of pakaua, that big-drop-banging-roof-rain, and cool...or rather COLD mornings for a week or more.  Itʻs been in the low 40s at sunrise for days.  Kinda hard to crawl out from under the three quilts.  And when we wear longjohns on our walks in the morning...

Though the above is from a webcam, the cold morning wind coming down from the mountain...brrrrr.  And what looks like snow, Iʻm pretty sure is patchy hail.  Almost looks like a pinto horse.

Mornings have been generally cloudfree, making our walk to Keanakākoʻi viewlicious.  Though I have to say that clouds, judiciously placed here and there, add interest to the scene.

And since weʻre here at the summit, I thought Iʻd share the above, so we donʻt forget The Three Months.  All of the ʻōlaʻi depicted were small enough not to be felt, though Iʻm glad theyʻre being recorded, if for nothing else as a reminder that Sheʻs still present, albeit deep down.

 Below, more or less the same image from June 16, 2018:

Itʻs important to remember, though many seem to have gone on with life.  If you werenʻt here near the summit and Kaluapele, or down at Keahialaka last summer, maybe impacts werenʻt as great.  But I continue to startle at the odd noise...

And in the nature of remembering, we remember our longtime friend Linda.  She came into my life at Maniniʻōwali, during the camping trip the full moon of January 1976, written about here a few weeks ago.  The evening of January 26th Leenda (think Spanish accent), or Naiʻa as she was also fondly known, suffered an aneurysm, and died just before sunrise on Monday, January 28, 2019.

Though we hadnʻt spent much time together of late, she was always there in the back of my mind.  Processing shocking sudden death has it challenges, no matter that Iʻve lost more than a few loved ones.  Itʻs never easy.  And so I paid close attention when I was watching Bluebloods on TV the other night, when near the close of the program came the following.  Itʻs from a Greek playwright named Aeschylus who lived from 525BC to 456BC:

And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.

Please note that "awful" in this context has an archaic meaning:  Inspiring reverential wonder or fear.

We do the best we can, how we can, and try to live better lives.

As always, with aloha,

BobbyC
maniniowali@gmail.com