When you want to see the stars, find someplace dark
Earthquakes have been a hot subject over the last couple months around here.
The ongoing collapse of the summit caldera on Kilauea has been generating a daily five point something earthquake. While not powerful enough to damage the facility, these events do show up in the data each night, bumping the telescope, disturbing the tracking, and occasionally ruining an exposure.
During this new Moon a partial solar eclipse will sweep across the Southern Sea south of Australia. At maximum the Moon will cover about 33% of the Sun.
We are now more than two months into this new eruption from Kilauea. Two months ago the fissures opened in the Leilani Estates subdivision and homes began to burn.
For those of us outside the eruption zone things are not quite as immediate. We read the daily news, peruse images of helicopter overflights each morning, and wonder when it will be over.
The multiple county civil defense status reports and various emergency alerts that pop up on our phones each day provide current information… A bit of the Mamalahoa Highway has collapsed in Volcano Village with a one lane restriction, the road to Kalapana has re-opened, there is no tsunami threat from that last 5.4 magnitude earthquake.
For the most part these events pass unnoticed by much of the island. The volcano area gets shaken up pretty well, but these fifth magnitude quakes are often not felt very far beyond that.
On the summit of Mauna Kea these daily quakes often do disturb the telescopes at night, bumping the tracking and ruining exposures, but otherwise too weak to cause any damage to the facilities.
When the vog is bad you not only see it, you smell the sulfur, it irritates eyes and nasal passages. Fire and brimstone reaches out to touch us all.
While the vog makes for spectacular sunsets, the vog can also be thick enough to curtail outside activity. A day like today, with brisk trade-winds to clear it away, is a welcome relief.
I have not attempted to go to photograph the lava river, despite a very strong desire to do so. The county and state have repeatedly talked about opening a lava viewing area. while there is a great deal of pressure from the community, so far nothing has materialized.
We are so ready for this eruption to be over.
Given the collapse of the summit caldera and the enormous volume of lava emitted so far, it may be possible that when this is over there will be no further eruption for a while. It may take a while for the volcano to recharge, perhaps a year or two. Will we return to the pattern of intermittent eruptions that was seen through much of the 20th century?
Arriving back to the house late I realize something is under the lanai. A loud rustling of leaves and a jingle betrays something bigger than one of the neighborhood stray cats.
Fortunately this dog has good tags, one tag includes an address just a few blocks away. Deb gets me a leash while I hold the collar, scratch between the ears, and make friends.
A nice evening for a stroll. This stray dog is very well behaved, walking alongside me up the street. A few fireworks are still going off and I worry about the dog bolting again. My guess is that some human accompaniment is all that was needed.
As I arrive in the cul-de-sac indicated on Google maps I see five houses, which one? I did not need to pull out the flashlight to check the addresses, the dog tugs me straight for one particular front door. Sure enough, the same address that is on the tag.
It is the right house?
Yes. I got hugged.
