USGS webcam image taken on Tuesday morning

UPDATE – (8:30 a.m.) – Episode 25 precursory activity is underway at Kīlauea volcano. A HVO/USGS Volcanic Activity Notice (VAN) was issued on Tuesday morning.

From the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory VAN issued at 7:56 a.m. HST:

Episode 25 precursory activity started within Halemaʻumaʻu on the morning of June 10. Glow and scattered spattering at the north vent changed to more continuous spattering in the early morning hours. At about 5:54 AM HST, lava overflowed the north vent cone and is currently flowing onto the crater floor. Episode 25 is forecast to begin between tomorrow (Wednesday) and Thursday. However, there is a chance that activity could proceed to high fountaining today.

In recent episodes of the ongoing eruption within Halemaʻumaʻu, low-level precursory activity has lasted from a few hours to a few days. This activity can include spatter from north and/or south vents, small dome fountains, and lava overflowing from one or both vents. At the start of previous episodes, precursory activity has rapidly escalated into sustained high fountaining over minutes to tens of minutes.

(BIVN) – There was an active lava flow visible on the USGS webcams on Tuesday morning. On Monday, scientists forecasted Episode 25 will likely begin between June 11th and June 13th, based on current rates of summit inflation. “This window is subject to change depending on changes in the rate of inflationary tilt,” the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory stated. 

USGS webcam image taken on Tuesday morning

From the USGS HVO analysis provided on Monday:

Tiltmeter UWD, near Uēkahuna, has recovered about 11 microradians of inflationary tilt since the end of episode 24 and a tiltmeter near Sandhill (SDH) has recovered 8 microradians. As a result, the forecast window for episode 25 has become slightly shorter since yesterday and is currently between Wednesday, June 11 and Friday, June 13. The window is subject to change depending on changes in the rate of inflationary tilt.

The current eruption has been characterized by episodic fountaining not seen in any eruptions since the 1983–86 episodic fountains at the beginning of the Puʻuʻōʻō eruption. Fountains and lava flows have erupted from two vents within Halema’um’a’u crater that we refer to as the north vent and south vent. Each of the previous fountaining episodes lasted from a few hours to over a week and have been accompanied by strong deflation of the summit region. Pauses between the fountaining episodes have been marked by an immediate change from deflation to inflation as the magma chamber recharges and repressurizes. Lava fountaining episodes have occurred approximately once per week since the start of the eruption.

USGS: This reference map depicts the Kīlauea summit eruption within Halema‘uma‘u crater that began on December 23, 2024. As of this posting on June 6, the eruption continues episodically. Most of the map data included here were collected during a USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory helicopter overflight on May 28, between episodes 23 and 24; for this reason, the provided statistics only reflect the first twenty-three episodes of the eruption. Additionally, the collected data were insufficient to calculate the total lava volume for the eruption at that time.