Vivid Red Lava Fountains Spew From Hawaii's Kilauea Volcano

Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano began erupting in the early hours of June 7, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS), spewing vivid red lava into the air.

The USGS said the summit eruption began within the Halemaumau crater at 4:44 am. The lava fountain heights have decreased since the eruption onset, and as of June 8, the alert level has been downgraded from a warning to a watch as “associated hazards are confined to the closed area established by Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.”

The USGS said while the summit eruption is expected to continue, it should remain confined to the crater within Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, and the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO) said it did not, “see any indication of activity migrating elsewhere” on the volcano. Credit: EpicLava via Storyful

Video transcript

- Woo!

- The lava came back to the pit out here. And it filled this pit about 732 feet over the next five months until May 27, 2021. Then, it went to sleep. September 29, 2021, the lave came back. It'd last until about December 11, 2022 . Pretty much kind of lowered the rate, diffused kind of slowly, but was just constantly out here.

November 27, just before that, [INAUDIBLE] came back to life, and the two of them kind of went back to sleep together. And then, slowly, it came back in the course of about a month. And on January 5, this year, 2023--