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Thermal camera data for the summit of Kilauea Volcano, 2019-2022

Published by U.S. Geological Survey | Department of the Interior | Metadata Last Checked: July 16, 2025 | Last Modified: 20220328
Following the 2018 collapses of the caldera floor at the summit of Kilauea Volcano (Anderson and others, 2019; Neal and others, 2019), the enlarged and deepened depression hosted a variety of volcanic activity between 2019 and 2022. These included an unprecedented water lake and two prolonged episodes of lava lake activity. This data release includes images from a stationary thermal camera poised on the western caldera rim, which provided a continuous record of the summit changes over this period. The thermal images provide an excellent observational record of the activity owing to the ability to see through thick volcanic fume, and the clarity with which they highlight active portions of the lava lake (Patrick and others, 2014). These thermal camera images cover three phases of activity at the summit of Kilauea. First, a water lake was present deep in Halema`uma`u crater from July 2019 to December 2020 (Nadeau and others, 2020). Second, a rising lava lake filled the bottom of Halema`uma`u from December 2020 to May 2021. Third, a second lava lake filled more of Halema`uma`u from September 2021 into early 2022 (through the end of this data release period in January 2022). References Anderson, K.R., Johanson, I.A., Patrick, M.R., Gu, M., Segall, P., Poland, M.P., Montgomery-Brown, E.K., and Miklius, A., 2019, Magma reservoir failure and the onset of caldera collapse at Kīlauea Volcano in 2018: Science, doi:10.1126/science.aaz1822 Nadeau, P.A., Diefenbach, A.K., Hurwitz, S., and Swanson, D.A., 2020, From lava to water: A new era at Kīlauea: Eos, 101, doi:10.1029/2020EO149557 Neal, C.A., Brantley, S.R., Antolik, L., Babb, J., Burgess, M., Calles, K., Cappos, M., Chang, J.C., Conway, S., Desmither, L., Dotray, P., Elias, T., Fukunaga, P., Fuke, S., Johanson, I.A., Kamibayashi, K., Kauahikaua, J., Lee, R.L., Pekalib, S., Miklius, A., Million, W., Moniz, C.J., Nadeau, P.A., Okubo, P., Parcheta, C., Patrick, M.R., Shiro, B,, Swanson, D.A., Tollett, W., Trusdell, F., Younger, E.F., Zoeller, M.H., Montgomery-Brown, E.K., Anderson, K.R., Poland, M.P., Ball, J., Bard, J., Coombs, M., Dietterich, H.R., Kern, C., Thelen, W.A., Cervelli, P.F., Orr, T., Houghton, B.F., Gansecki, C., Hazlett, R., Lundgren, P., Diefenbach, A.K., Lerner, A.H., Waite, G., Kelly, P., Clor, L., Werner, C., Mulliken, K., and Fisher, G., 2018, The 2018 rift eruption and summit collapse of Kilauea Volcano: Science, doi:10.1126/science.aav7046. Patrick, M., Orr, T., Antolik, L., Lee, L., and Kamibayashi, K., 2014, Continuous monitoring of Hawaiian volcanoes with thermal cameras: Journal of Applied Volcanology, v. 3, no. 1, doi:10.1186/2191-5040-3-1 Patrick, M.R., Swanson, D.A., Zoeller, M.H., Mulliken, K.M., Parcheta, C.E., Lynn, K.J., Downs, D.T., and Flinders, A.F., 2021, Water-level data for the crater lake at the summit of Kīlauea Volcano, Island of Hawaiʻi, 2019–2020: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P9262JDH.

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