Sunday, December 12, 2021. 121221... A Pauselet, pēlā paha?

 I know...Inconsistencies are sometimes a bother.  Where is he?  Ha come he not writing?  Well...

We had some weathers a week ago.  Kinda took many of us by surprise, because it didnʻt appear we were On High Alert.  Civil Defense (CD) messages said Blizzard Warning.  I said "OK...".  They said "Catastrophic Rain Event".  OK again, after having survived pretty easily that time more than several years ago when TheBigCloud sat on Maunaloa in Kaʻū and had 36" in 24 hrs.  I think can handle.  They said "Winds to 50mph".  I thought:  Oh.  Like Waimea on a really really windy day.  OK...

But what had, despite the innocuous-sounding "Kona Low", was more akin to Hurricane Iselle in August 2014.  Ok...maybe not THAT bad, but scary enough.  And neva have lights my hale from lunchtime last Sunday the 5th, till 3p Tuesday the 7th.  About 50 hours.  Unexpected.  I didnʻt fill up extra jugs for flushing, or big pots for drinking, or do food prep.  Thatʻs how it goes sometime.  Having lived through worse, you watch the tank overflow and creatively deal...

LookGood:  my hand holding orange camera case reflected on wet window.  Only reason the tankfall wasnʻt more vigorous was that the gutter downspout was leafclogged, and so IT was overflowing too.

We got precious few messages from CD.  And what they said dealt with the highway being closed at Kāwā in Kaʻū.  Nothing about the lights, or lack of lights.  I called CD and they said GoLook HELCOʻs Twitter feed.  OK... And that will help how???  No lights.  Charging cell phone in car idling in driveway.  Most of my friends and I donʻt tweet.  No lights.  No water pump.  No water from the faucet.  Because County Water stops down by Hirano Store.  And the majority of people in Puna are on catchment.  But.  Can handle.  And so we did.

And of course, weathers are not new phenomena.

ʻou.pē 

1. vs. Beaten down, as by storm (UL 79); to cast down (2 Oihn. 25.8). Pēpē Hilo nāwali i ka ua, ʻoupē i ke anu a ka makani, Hilo is crushed weak by the rain, beaten in the coldness of the wind.

Substitute [name of town or region] for "Hilo", and you get the idea.  

And then an entirely apt descriptor for what we watched for hours on end:

hili

1. nvt. To braid or plait, as a lei or candlenuts; a braid, plaiting, string. See lei hili. Ka hili ʻana i ka lauoho (1 Pet. 3.3), the plaiting of the hair. (PPN firi.)

2. vi. To turn aside, deviate, miss the way, wander, stray. Cf. hilikau, pūhili. Mea hili i hope, straggler. Ua pā hili, rain blown by wind in various directions. Mai hili ʻiʻo paha au inā ʻaʻole kēia kamaʻāina, I might have gone quite astray had it not been for this native of the place. hoʻo.hili Caus/sim.; to lead astray. (PPN fili.)

3. nvt. To whip, smite, thrash, switch, bat; batter, as in baseball; stroke, as in fighting. Mea hili kinipōpō, batter. hoʻo.hili Caus/sim.; to pretend to whip, to whip gently.

4. n. Bark used in dyeing, as hili kukui, hili kōlea, hili noni; the dark-brown dye made from this bark; a tapa dyed with hili; to dye with hili.

As Iʻve said, a fun and often enlightening pastime is browsing Hawaiian Dictionaries.  So much to learn!  And too, understanding that context is everything when attempting to translate languages.  For those like me who are far from fluent, thereʻs a lot of flipping of pages back and forth and back again, attempting to discern just the right flavor and taste.  And then of course the "Phone A (Fluent) Friend" to mull and consider.

At Kīlauea Military Camp (KMC), heavy ʻōhiʻa branch ends torn off and strewn about.

And a young koa toppled...

And amidst tumult a week ago, Pelehonuamea sheltered in place, keeping the lua warm.  Then she reappeared last Monday evening...

Last Monday afternoon, an impressive display of swirling māhu wreaths Halemaʻumaʻu.

And a bit earlier in the day, thereʻs Kama, calm cool(er) and collected.  The dark pōhaku centered below looks to me like a pig...Peleʻs erstwhile suitor, the eight-eyed Kamapuaʻa, resident in the lua for nearly a year.

And then today:  121221 (good fun date to type!) the seismogram of tremor at RIMD.  Decrease, then increase, then?????

Tilting downward.  It of course remains to be seen what next.

Above, at 1228p today, the little hotdot of the west vent crater, and the cooling surface of the loko ahi.  Note that the rim of the lake is a bit hotter, as is a flow to the left.  The lake surface (and interior) is complex, and there are lots of leakages, and interior connections we see and guess about via the the thermal cam.  The rim of the lake is more easily discerned below, thanks to morning shadows.

So.  A Pauselet today?  Only time will tell.

The HVO photo below was captured on Tuesday December 7.  The west vent spatter cone stands 66 feet tall above the level of the loko ahi.  Left side outlet new, post-pause, right side and center are reoccupied.  And the lake rim is clearly seen.

 Not a whole lotta segue to the following... 

I accompanied cc on a Costco run on Wednesday, December 8, 2021.  Coming back over the Saddle:

OUTSTANDING!!!  Kalei Nuuhiwa says theyʻre ao manō, and are often a portent of manō attacks or volcanic eruptions.  Indeed, indeed.  Thatʻs the bulk of Maunaloa, with a bit of hau kea, snow, on right horizon slope.

And in the yard, amaryllises start to bloom.  Despite being subjected to ua pā hili, they, and we, are quite resilient.  As it should be.

Hiki?  So.  GoLook HVO site for whatʻs happening with pele, and Iʻll keep sending updates as time allows...

Be well, be safe, be kind.

Aloha, always, aloha.

BobbyC

maniniowali@gmail.com