02/03/2024
Kilauea is not erupting but Pele continues to keep us on our toes while she moves about the summit and the southwest rift. It’s never a dull moment on an active volcano!
Here is the latest update from USGS and a map showing the intensity and location of seismicity:
“Kīlauea is not erupting. The ongoing seismic swarm continues with most earthquakes occurring beneath the Koaʻe fault zone 5-8 miles (8-12 km) southwest of Kīlauea caldera. There have been roughly 15-20 earthquakes per hour in this region for most of the day. There continue to be a few scattered earthquakes within Kīlauea caldera, but no significant clusters of activity.
Tiltmeters at Sand Hill and Uēkahuna bluff continue to show ground motion at consistent directions and rates, suggesting that the summit region is deflating as magma moves from this region to the southwest.
A significant amount of lava has been intruded south and southwest of Kīlauea caldera since Saturday, January 27th, 2024. Models suggest an accumulation of as much as 40 million cubic yards (30 million cubic meters) in the region to the southwest of the caldera during this event. As long as the intrusion continues, there is a chance that an eruption could occur within or southwest of the caldera with little advanced warning.
Upgrades to the network may continue to cause intermittent outages that are affecting public access to monitoring data. HVO maintains internal access to volcano monitoring data and will continue to report on volcanic activity. We apologize for any inconvenience during this dynamic time.
Kīlauea volcano alert level and aviation color code remain at WATCH/ORANGE as the situation remains dynamic. HVO will continue to issue daily Kīlauea updates; additional notices will be issued as activity warrants.
More details are available in the Kīlauea daily update issued this morning: https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hans-public/notice/DOI-USGS-HVO-2024-02-01T19:44:10+00:00”
USGS seismic map
This map shows recent unrest at Kīlauea volcano. Yellow circles mark earthquake locations from January 31, 2024, through noon on February 1, 2024, as recorded by HVO seismometers. Seismicity began early January 31 in the summit region and shifted to the southwest along the Koa‘e fault system late on January 31, 2024. In total, nearly 1,000 events have been detected in this area since January 31. Depths have remained consistent, 1–4 km (less than a mile–2.5 mi) below the surface, and the rates have persisted at 25-30 locatable earthquakes per hour. Magnitudes range from less than 1 to a maximum of around 3.5. Patterns of earthquakes and ground deformation indicate that pulses of magma continue to move beneath the surface of southwest of the summit along the Koa‘e fault zone.
