Would you mind Madame Pele for a neighbor in Hawaii?

Last night my husband turned off all of the lights in the house and took me upstairs with the flashlight. He then turned off the flashlight once we got to the bedroom, and it got pitch dark. We live in the middle of a Hawaiian rainforest and there are no street lights or big city light pollution so it gets very dark--unless the moon is out. He then directed my gaze out of the window and told me to let my eyes adjust to the dark then tell him what I saw.

What I saw was a pinkish, yellowish, orange spot glowing off in the distance between the outline of the ohia trees. It was the glow from the newest lava flow at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, courtesy of Madame Pele, the Hawaiian Fire Goddess who makes her home in the Kilauea Volcano.

Residents of the Puna district on the Big Island are watching this new flow cautiously. Right now it is a slow moving a'a flow traveling over previous lava flows and poses no threat to human activity. It could continue like this, stop flowing altogether, or turn into something much more dangerous to the surrounding communities.

If a lava tube starts to form, a fast moving pahoehoe flow would result meaning the lava could remain hotter and travel faster in the tube and further away from the eruption site.

The current direction of this flow is moving northeast towards the town of Pahoa, less than 5 miles away from us. Read more about Predicting Pele's Path, and Lava Flow Path Sparks Concern.

We respect Madame Pele and realize that we are just caretakers of this aina, the Hawaiian word for land, but we still hope and pray that she remains a good neighbor and stays on her side of the property line--namely in the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park!

Comments

[Evelyn]

The idea of living in the middle of a Hawaiian rain forest and gazing at a "pinkish, yellowish, orange spot glowing off in the distance between the outline of the ohia trees" melted me instantly! You're killing me! What a beautiful site! What a beautiful home! :)

[HawaiiVacationGifts]

Evelyn,
Thank you so much for making me feel good:) It has been a week now since I wrote that post, and every night we look for it. Some nights the glow is larger and brighter than others (I think it has something to do with the cloud cover and reflection off of it), and a couple of nights we could not see it then, but saw it later in the evening.