Kaʻū News Briefs Nov. 7, 2024

MAYOR-ELECT KIMO ALAMEDA, who won every precinct and by more than 9,000 votes county-wide this week, said on Thursday that he looks forward to delving into the Kaʻū community to help solve problems and give support.             

    "Dr. Kimo," who is 55, with a Phd in psychology and a career of counseling and running health care and public service agencies for nonprofits and government, said he also wants to thank his Kaʻū Campaign Chair Raylene A'uli'i Moses.
    Moses, who coordinated efforts in  Kaʻū, said she is so "thrilled that he won, and for what is to come, and what he can do for Hawai'i Island." She noted that he is a supporter of the planned Hawaiian Immersion School in Wai'ohinu, and completing the sewage treatment facilities in Pahala and Naalehu. She said he has vowed to complete improvements at the parks, including lighting of playing fields, upgrades of the tennis courts in Pāhala and Nāʻālehu, swimming pool in Pāhala, restroom facility at Nāʻālehu Park and needed improvements at Ocean View Park.

Dr. Kimo Alameda, Hawai'i County Mayor-elect,  receives a lei and a hug from Kaʻū Campaign Chair  Raylene  Moses on Election Night at Nani Mau  Gardens. Photo by Tim Wright

   Alameda said that crime, roaming animals and abandoned cars are problems he said he wants to help solve in Ocean View. 

    Alameda noted that he supported the protesters against the proposed Punalu'u development and that as mayor he will do a deep dive into the issue to try to create a solution. He said he has family members on both sides and wants to "study deeper on cost benefits. Get a better pulse of the community."
    Moses said Alameda's forte is "to bring the people together," and to create a positive, civil discussion. She said he has a talent in helping people to feel comfortable so they can talk together to solve problems.        

   Alameda began his campaign almost two years ago and promised to remain "on the ground" with people in each community around the island. He said, "We knocked on doors. It paid off."   

   Alameda said that as Mayor, one of his first tasks is to conduct "a soft informal review of the budget to see what money we got, what is allocated, where more money is needed."

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THE ART & SCIENCE OF GEOLOGIC MAPPING is the title of this week's Volcano Watch, the weekly article and activity update by U.S. Geological Survey Hawaiian Volcano Observatory scientists and affiliates. This column is by HVO geologist Drew Downs: Geologic mapping has been one of the most fundamental mandates of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) since its establishment in 1879. Congress 
created the USGS to "classify the public lands and examine the geological structure, mineral resources, and products within and outside the national domain." The famous western US explorer John Wesley  Powell (also the second director of the USGS) convinced Congress into authorizing the "preparation of the geological map of the United States." The first geologic maps were uniform in size and contained all available information on topography and geology, with accompanying text describing mapped geology.          But sometimes too much information on a map can make it difficult to read and interpret. Modern maps tend to be more versatile; displaying geologic deposits (also commonly referred to as map units) and features of special interest for a project or investigation.
    Modern geologic mapping efforts have centered more around investigations that are deemed of critical importance, such as those vital to energy (oil and gas) and economic (minerals and ore deposits) resources, surface and groundwater resources, urban development and land use. The last one is of particular importance as the Earth is a dynamic place and understanding the locations and ages of past volcanic (lava flows and tephras) and tectonic (faults and fractures) features gives us a blueprint for where and when future activity may occur.
    Geologic maps are not an exact depiction of the Earth's surface. Instead, geologic maps display a generalization of interested units and features in correspondence with the scale of a map. If mapping is done at a small scale, which would be zoomed out to show a large area, then smaller geologic units and features might not be able to be accurately displayed. In the end, everything depends on the scale being used and what the geologic mapper is trying to portray.

Examples of Hawaii geologic maps. The lefthand map is a USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory map created on September 17, 2024, within hours of remote sensing (helicopter overflight) of the eruption that occurred from September 15–20, 2024. Several age ranges for lava flows of interest are noted by color changes, with those that erupted from 1790–2018 in purple (older lava flows are gray), those erupted on September 15 in pink, and those erupted September 16–17 in red (with the active fissure as a yellow line). This map also shows roads and the boundary of Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park, as these would be of interest to those using this map. The righthand geologic map is that of the Island of Hawaiʻi from the Geologic Map of the State of Hawaii by Sherrod and others (2021). This map was compiled through decades of work and displays the various lava flows, tephra deposits, and other rock and sediment types mapped through fieldwork and remote sensing. The primary purpose of this geologic map is to show all mappable geologic units with their colors denoting their source volcano and age. This map is free to download at https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/sim3143.

    In the case of USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory geologic mapping on the Island of Hawaiʻi, the primary map units of interest are volcanic vents (such as fissures and scoria cones) and their associated lava flows and tephra deposits divided by age. It's easy to make these determinations for young eruptions that have been witnessed, with eruptions over the last few years being mapped within hours or days of activity starting using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software. Remote sensing techniques using aerial and satellite imagery have also made this much quicker.

   While some older lava flows can be mapped using remote sensing, others exposed to the elements for hundreds or thousands of years can be harder to tell apart. Therefore, diagnostic criteria from the field or lab is usually required to distinguish their geographic extents when compiling a geologic map. Geologists make field excursions to document minerals present in the lava flows and their abundances, and collect samples to analyze chemistry, radiometric ages, and paleomagnetism. Usually, a combination of these is needed to put together a full picture on a map sheet.

    For geologic maps published by the USGS, there is a standardized set of symbols, patterns, and colors that are used: the Geologic Map Schema, or GeMS for short. Whereas symbols and lines tend to be objective on a geologic map (for example, set line thicknesses, styles for things line contacts, faults, and ground cracks), colors used for geologic map units can be more subjective. It is common for geologic maps that portray volcanic terrains with young lava flows and tephras to have the 'hottest' colors, such as reds and oranges, and those colors gradually get 'cooler' going to greens, blues to purples as the map units get older. This is makes it easy to glance at a geologic map and get a quick sense of the relative age of volcanic activity.

    These USGS geologic maps are generally printed but all are now also published as GIS digital databases that are freely available to be downloaded. A recent geologic map addition to get a sense for scale, color, and symbology used is the Geologic Map for the State of Hawaii and its digital database published in 2021. The next time you are looking at a geologic map, you can appreciate both the art and science that went into its presentation.

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Volcano Activity Updates
    

Kīlauea is not erupting. Its USGS Volcano Alert level is ADVISORY.

    Over the past week, earthquake rates beneath Kīlauea summit and upper-to-middle East Rift Zone were slightly lower than the previous week. About 25 earthquakes were located beneath the summit, and about 70 were located in the upper-to-middle East Rift Zone. Ground deformation rates continue to show slow inflation at the summit and near the September 15-20 middle East Rift Zone eruption site. Future intrusive episodes and eruptions could occur with continued magma supply.
   Mauna Loa is not erupting. Its USGS Volcano Alert Level is at NORMAL.
    A brief increase in earthquake activity at Kamaʻehuakanaloa volcano (formerly Lōʻihi Seamount) took place November 1-2. More than 100 events were detected, the largest of which was a M4.3. Activity could have been related to magma movement, but past eruptions at Kamaʻehuakanaloa have been accompanied by thousands of earthquakes over days to weeks.
    One earthquake was reported felt in the Hawaiian Islands during the past week: a M4.8 earthquake 5 km (3 mi) SW of Pāhala at 38 km (23 mi) depth on Nov. 5 at 1:42 a.m. HST. This event was part of the ongoing swarm of deep seismicity that has been occurring beneath the Pāhala area since 2019
    HVO continues to closely monitor Kīlauea and Mauna Loa.
HPD ARRESTED 16 FOR DUI during the week of Oct. 28 through Nov. 3. Hawai`i Police Department made the arrests for driving under the influence of an intoxicant. Nine of the drivers were involved in a traffic accident. Two were under the age of 21.
    So far this year, there have been 814 DUI arrests compared with 805 during the same period last year. This is an increase of 1.12 percent.
    HPD’s Traffic Services Section reviewed all updated crashes and found 832 major crashes so far this year, compared with 711 during the same time last year. This represents an increase of 17 percent.
    To date, there were 23 fatal crashes, resulting in 25 fatalities (two of which had multiple deaths, one was reclassified as suicide, one reclassified as a medical condition, and two died at a later date), compared with 13 fatal crashes, resulting in 14 fatalities (one of which had multiple deaths, one died at a later date, and one crash reclassified as a medical condition) for the same time last year. This represents an increase of 76.9 percent for fatal crashes and 78.6 percent for fatalities.
   To date, the non-traffic fatality count so far this year is 0 compared to 0 non-traffic fatalities (not on a public roadway) for the same time last year.
   HPD promises that DUI roadblocks and patrols will continue island wide.