Paradise lost

At least 21 homes destroyed; 1,700 people evacuated

The number of homes destroyed by Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano climbed to 21 as scientists reported lava spewing more than 200 feet high.

PAHOA, Hawaii (AP) — The number of homes destroyed by Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano climbed to 21 Sunday as scientists reported lava spewing more than 200 feet into the air.

Some of the more than 1,700 people who evacuated prepared for the possibility they may not return for quite some time.

Less than a week ago, Leilani Estates was the picture of serenity on Hawaii’s Big Island, a subdivision in the Big Island’s eastern Puna district filled with wooden homes nestled into tropical plant-filled lots.

The eruption of the island’s most active volcano changed everything.

Shortly after Kilauea erupted Thursday, the ground split open on the east side of Leilani Estates, exposing an angry red beneath the lush landscape. From the gash, molten rock burbled and splashed, then shot as high as 80 to 100 feet in the air.

The Hawaii County Civil Defense Agency called it “active volcanic fountaining.” Some local residents insisted it was Pele, the Hawaiian volcano goddess, come to reclaim her land. Residents there were ordered to flee amid threats of fires and “extremely high levels of dangerous” sulfur dioxide gas.

Soon, another such fissure had formed less than three streets to the west. Then another, and another. From the vents, hot steam – and noxious gases – rose, before magma broke through and splattered into the air.

As of Sunday morning local time, at least 10 such fissure vents were reported in the neighborhood, including two that had opened anew late Saturday night. The fissures are forming on along a northeast-southwest line in the rift zone, and not all of the older fissures are still actively spewing lava, said Wendy Stovall, a volcanologist with the U.S. Geological Survey.

“As the eruption progresses, there will become a preferred pathway for the magma to go through,” Stovall said. “Some of the outer vents along this fissure line will start to close up and congeal because the lava is going to essentially harden.”

Once that happens, lava fountains from the remaining open vents can shoot even higher – reaching up to 1,000 feet, Stovall said. On Saturday, lava from one of the newer fissures spurted as high as 230 feet into the air, according to the Geological Survey.

More outbreaks are likely to occur along the rift zone, officials said.

Drone footage showed lava spouting along the fissures that had formed, creeping toward Leilani Estates homes and leaving lines of smoldering trees in their wake. The flows destroyed or cut off several streets in the neighborhood – typically home to about 1,700 people, before most of them evacuated last week.

Meanwhile, over the past few days, some photographers have followed the fissures, posting dramatic photos and videos of lava spattering into the air or oozing across roads. Officials have urged everyone to leave Leilani Estates, where a mandatory evacuation order remains.

“Being in Hawaii and being around lava you get used to the way it behaves and so you kind of become comfortable around it,” Stovall said. “(The lava flows) are mesmerizing to see. I understand why people want to see them but it’s not advisable. It’s a dangerous situation.”

The county civil defense agency put it more bluntly in an advisory Sunday: “Please, the residents of Leilani need your help by staying out of the area. This is not the time for sightseeing.”

The agency announced Sunday that certain Leilani Estates residents might be able to return briefly to their homes to retrieve pets, medicine or important items left behind – but would need to leave immediately afterward because of “the very unstable conditions of air quality and of the roads.”

At least nine homes in the subdivision have been destroyed by fire, according to Hawaii County Mayor Harry Kim.

“This is a very fast-moving situation,” Kim told the news site. “This is unfortunately not the end.”

Kilauea first erupted Thursday, sending fountains of lava gushing out of the ground and billowing clouds of steam and volcanic ash into the sky on the eastern side of the island.

Three days later, some residents there continue to suffer through a triple whammy of threats. From below, lava has spewed forth out of an increasing number of fissures that have opened up in the ground, oozing toward homes.

Several earthquakes – including the strongest to hit Hawaii in more than four decades – have jolted the island’s residents, some as they were in the midst of evacuating.

And in the air, noxious fumes from the volcano are what some officials say could be the greatest threat to public health in the wake of its eruption.

After the eruption Thursday, the island shook at regular intervals, but especially around midday Friday: A 5.6-magnitude quake hit south of the volcano around 11:30 a.m., followed about an hour later by a 6.9-magnitude temblor, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The latter was felt as far away as Oahu and struck in nearly the exact same place as a deadly 7.4-magnitude earthquake in 1975, according to the Geological Survey.

Videos posted to social media showed homes visibly shaking, items clattering to the floor at supermarkets and waves forming in swimming pools as the 6.9-magnitude quake rattled the Big Island on Friday afternoon.

“I think the whole island felt it,” said Cori Chong, who was in her bedroom with her foster dog, Monty, when the magnitude-6.9 quake struck, frightening both of them. Even though Chong lives on the Hamakua coast, about an hour north of the earthquake’s epicenter, the shaking in her home was so violent that it caused furniture to move and glass to shatter. David Burlingame, who lives about two miles west of Leilani Estates, told The Washington Post that he and a friend ran outside when the earthquake hit “and watched my house just shake back and forth.” “Everybody is kind of on edge,” Burlingame said Saturday, of both the potential for additional earthquakes and the unpredictability of the lava flows. “The worst part is kind of waiting to see, because you really never can tell what can happen.”