Volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island erupts

THE Kilauea volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island erupted and shot a steam cloud into the atmosphere that lasted about an hour, an official with the National Weather Service has said.

The eruption, above, began late on Sunday within the Halema’uma’u crater, the US Geological Survey said.

The volcano is located within Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

Tom Birchard, a senior forecaster with the National Weather Service in Hawaii, said a new lava flow interacted with a pool of water inside the crater and that led to a short-lived but fairly vigorous eruption.

All the water evaporated out of the lake and a steam cloud shot up about 30,000ft into the atmosphere, Mr Birchard said.