More Like this

1. The 2018 Eruption of Kīlauea: Insights, Puzzles, and Opportunities for Volcano Science

   https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-031621-075925  

   Anderson, Kyle R.; Shea, Thomas; Lynn, Kendra J.; Montgomery-Brown, Emily K.; Swanson, Donald A.; Patrick, Matthew R.; Shiro, Brian R.; Neal, Christina A. (May 2024, Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences)

   The science of volcanology advances disproportionately during exceptionally large or well-observed eruptions. The 2018 eruption of Kīlauea Volcano (Hawai‘i) was its most impactful in centuries, involving an outpouring of more than one cubic kilometer of basalt, a magnitude 7 flank earthquake, and the volcano's largest summit collapse since at least the nineteenth century. Eruptive activity was documented in detail, yielding new insights into large caldera-rift eruptions; the geometry of a shallow magma storage-transport system and its interaction with rift zone tectonics; mechanisms of basaltic tephra-producing explosions; caldera collapse mechanics; and the dynamics of fissure eruptions and high-volume lava flows. Insights are broadly applicable to a range of volcanic systems and should reduce risk from future eruptions. Multidisciplinary collaboration will be required to fully leverage the diversity of monitoring data to address many of the most important outstanding questions. ▪ Unprecedented observations of a caldera collapse and coupled rift zone eruption yield new opportunities for advancing volcano science. ▪ Magma flow to a low-elevation rift zone vent triggered quasi-periodic step-like collapse of a summit caldera, which pressurized the magma system and sustained the eruption. ▪ Kīlauea's magmatic-tectonic system is tightly interconnected over tens of kilometers, with complex feedback mechanisms and interrelated hazards over widely varying time scales. ▪ The eruption revealed magma stored in diverse locations, volumes, and compositions, not only beneath the summit but also within the volcano's most active rift zone. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Volume 52 is May 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates. 

   more » « less
2. Attenuation within Mauna Loa and Kīlauea

   https://doi.org/10.1093/gji/ggaf474  

   Butler, Rhett (December 2025, Geophysical Journal International)

   SUMMARY This study presents the first comparative measurements of seismic attenuation between Mauna Loa and Kīlauea volcanoes on Hawai’i Island. The focus is on key physical variables found within Kīlauea, and extending our knowledge of these from Kīlauea to Mauna Loa. The measurements of attenuation, elastic/anelastic moduli (µ rigidity and K bulk), T temperature, P pressure, basalt activation energy, are uniformly applied to these adjacent volcanoes (34 km separation) for comparative analyses. While numerous seismic attenuation studies have been conducted at Kīlauea, Mauna Loa has remained unexamined in this context until now. I extend previous methodologies to measure both shear (Qµ) and bulk (QK) attenuation over propagation paths from both volcanic calderas to the Aloha Cabled Observatory, located 442–464 km away at 4728 m depth. Utilizing earthquake displacement source spectra from shallow (near sea level) events beneath both calderas, I derive frequency-dependent effective Q values across the 2–35 Hz frequency band. My analytical approach employs the t* formulation (ratio of traveltime to Q) to separate attenuation along path segments, allowing direct comparison between the two volcanic systems. Results reveal that Mauna Loa exhibits substantially higher attenuation (lower Q values) than Kīlauea for both bulk and shear waves. At 10 Hz, Qµ is approximately four times higher for Kīlauea (∼400) than Mauna Loa (∼115), while QK displays even greater contrast with Kīlauea (∼425) exceeding Mauna Loa (∼25) by a factor of 17. Both volcanoes demonstrate QK < Qµ across most frequencies, emphasizing the significance of bulk losses in volcanic environments. This contradicts traditional assumptions held, that bulk attenuation is negligible in Earth. The pronounced difference in attenuation between these adjacent volcanoes, which share the same hotspot origin, cannot be explained solely by temperature–pressure dependent activation energy models. While I calculated expected Q variations using established basalt activation energies (59–68 kJ mole−1), the observed differences exceed predictions by an order of magnitude. This suggests additional mechanisms are at work, likely involving partial melting processes. My findings indicate that the internal structure of Mauna Loa may contain a greater proportion of partial melt or different melt geometry than Kīlauea, significantly affecting seismic wave propagation. At higher frequencies (17–33 Hz), both volcanoes show evidence of comparable scattering effects. This research provides new insights into the internal composition and dynamics of Hawaiian volcanoes, demonstrating that despite their proximity and shared magmatic source, Mauna Loa and Kīlauea possess distinctly different attenuation characteristics that reflect fundamental differences in their internal structure and melt distribution. These findings enhance our understanding of volcanic processes and contribute to improved interpretation of seismic data in volcanic environments. 

   more » « less
3. Slow changes in lava chemistry at Kama‘ehuakanaloa linked to sluggish mantle upwelling on the margin of the Hawaiian plume

   https://doi.org/10.1130/G51350.1  

   Pietruszka, Aaron J.; Garcia, Michael O.; Carlson, Richard W.; Hauri, Erik H. (May 2023, Geology)

   Abstract Temporal variations in lava chemistry at active submarine volcanoes are difficult to decipher due to the challenges of dating their eruptions. Here, we use high-precision measurements of 226Ra-230Th disequilibria in basalts from Kama‘ehuakanaloa (formerly Lō‘ihi) to estimate model ages for recent eruptions of this submarine Hawaiian pre-shield volcano. The ages range from ca. 0 to 2300 yr (excluding two much older samples) with at least five eruptions in the past ∼150 yr. Two snapshots of the magmatic evolution of Kama‘ehuakanaloa (or “Kama‘ehu”) are revealed. First, a long-term transition from alkalic to tholeiitic volcanism was nearly complete by ca. 2 ka. Second, a systematic short-term fluctuation in ratios of incompatible elements (e.g., Th/Yb) for summit lavas occurred on a time scale of ∼1200 yr. This is much longer than the ∼200-yr-long historical cycle in lava chemistry at the neighboring subaerial volcano, Kīlauea. The slower pace of the variation in lava chemistry at Kama‘ehu is most likely controlled by sluggish mantle upwelling on the margin of the Hawaiian plume. 

   more » « less
4. Crustal to mantle melt storage during the evolution of Hawaiian volcanoes

   https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adu9332  

   Gazel, Esteban; Dayton, Kyle; Liang, Wenwei; Hua, Junlin; Lynn, Kendra J; Hammer, Julia E (May 2025, Science Advances)

   As the Pacific Plate migrates over the mantle plume below Hawaiʻi, magma flux decreases, resulting in changes in eruptive volume, style, and composition. It is thought that melt storage becomes deeper and ephemeral with the transition from highly voluminous tholeiitic (shield stage) to the less voluminous alkaline (post-shield and rejuvenation stages) magmatism. To quantitatively test this, we applied high-precision fluid inclusion barometry via Raman spectroscopy to samples from representative volcanoes of different evolutionary stages. This suggests an evolution from shield-stage shallow magma storage (~1 to 2 kilometers) for Kīlauea to a post-shield stage that includes crustal magma storage within the volcanic edifice (~2 kilometers) and deeper storage below the Moho (~20 to 27 kilometers) for Haleakalā. The rejuvenation stage (Diamond Head) displays mantle-dominated storage (~22 to 30 kilometers). High melt fluxes likely form stable conduits from the mantle to a shallow reservoir in the shield volcanoes. As melt flux decreases, the Moho becomes the boundary controlling melt stagnation and evolution. 

   more » « less
5. Long-lived partial melt beneath Cascade Range volcanoes

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-024-01630-y  

   Pang, Guanning; Abers, Geoffrey A; Moran, Seth C; Thelen, Weston A (February 2025, Nature Geoscience)

   Quantitative estimates of magma storage are fundamental to evaluating volcanic dynamics and hazards. Yet our understanding of subvolcanic magmatic plumbing systems and their variability remains limited. There is ongoing debate regarding the ephemerality of shallow magma storage and its volume relative to eruptive output, and so whether an upper-crustal magma body could be a sign of imminent eruption. Here we present seismic imaging of subvolcanic magmatic systems along the Cascade Range arc from systematically modelling the three-dimensional scattered wavefield of teleseismic body waves. This reveals compelling evidence of low-seismic-velocity bodies indicative of partial melt between 5 and 15 km depth beneath most Cascade Range volcanoes. The magma reservoirs beneath these volcanoes vary in depth, size and complexity, but upper-crustal magma bodies are widespread, irrespective of the eruptive flux or time since the last eruption of the associated volcano. This indicates that large volumes of melts can persist at shallow depth throughout eruption cycles beneath large volcanoes. 

   more » « less