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Minor explosive eruption of Kilauea in Hawai’i

By Scott Bachmeier •

Himawari-8 Ash Cloud Height product {click to play animation]

Himawari-8 Ash Cloud Height product [click to play animation]

An explosive eruption from the Halema’uma’u crater at the Kilauea summit on the Big Island of Hawai’i occurred around 1550 UTC on 19 May 2018. Using Himawari-8 data, multispectral retrievals of parameters such as Ash Cloud Height (above) and Ash Loading (below) from the NOAA/CIMSS Volcanic Cloud Monitoring site helped to characterize the volcanic ash plume.

Himawari-8 Ash Loading product [click to play animation]

Himawari-8 Ash Loading product [click to play animation]

Later in the day, a Suomi NPP VIIRS True-color Red-Green-Blue (RGB) image viewed using RealEarth (below) showed the hazy signature of volcanic smog or “vog” which had spread out to the south, southwest and west of the Big Island. Light amounts of ash fall were reported downwind of Kilauea.

Suomi NPP VIIRS True-color RGB image [click to enlarge]

Suomi NPP VIIRS True-color RGB image [click to enlarge]

Categories: Himawari-8, RealEarth, Red-Green-Blue (RGB) images, Suomi NPP, VIIRS, Volcanic activity