Pele | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

August 10, 2026 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Keʻelikōlani and Pele

“We could hear the explosions in Hilo; it was like the noise of battle.”

“Day and night the ancient forest was ablaze, and the scene was vivid beyond description. By the 25th of March the lava was within seven miles of Hilo, and steadily advancing. Until this time we had hoped that Hilo would not be threatened. But the stream pursued its way.” (Coan)

On November 5, 1880, an eruption located near the 11,000-foot elevation, about a mile above Puʻu Ulaʻula began on Mauna Loa’s northeast rift zone that would eventually send lava closer to Hilo Bay than any other in over a thousand years.

May 1st, 1881, a small, short-lived eruption at Mauna Loa’s summit heralded the beginning of an eruptive sequence that was to be followed six months later by the voluminous flank eruption which would soon threaten the then-small town of Hilo.

“The glare was intense, and was seen at great distances. Brilliant jets of lava were thrown high in the air, and a pillar of blazing gases mounted thousands of feet skyward, spreading out into a canopy of sanguinary light which resembled, though upon a larger scale, the so-called “pine-tree appendage” formed over Vesuvius during its eruptions by the vertical column of vapors with its great horizontal cloud.”

“Meanwhile a raging river of lava, about three-fourths of a mile wide and from fifteen to thirty feet deep, rushed down the north-east flank of the great dome, and ran some thirty miles to the base of Mauna Kea.” (Coan)

“We met crowds of people returning from the flow, and all reported it active and coming rapidly down the gulch. We rode up to it before dark and found that the stream was entirely confined to the gulch and intensely active.”

“The flow was on an average about seventy-five feet wide and from ten to thirty feet in depth as it filled the gulch up level with its banks. The sight was grand. The whole frontage was one mass of liquid lava carrying on its surface huge cakes of partially cooled lava. Soon after we arrived the flow reached a deep hole, some ten or fifteen feet in depth, with perpendicular sides.” (Hitchcock)

“Troops of boys and girls, young men and women, were watching the flow. They plunged poles into the viscid lava as it urged itself slowly onward; drawing out small lumps of the adhering fusion, they moulded it, before it had time to cool, into various forms at will.”

“They made cups, canes, vases, tubes, and other articles out of this molten clay, and these they sold to visitors and strangers at from twenty-five cents to a dollar or more for a specimen. All went away with fresh spoils from the spoiler. (Coan)

The advancing lava flow split into three forks at the 2,400-foot elevation (8.5-miles from Hilo Bay), only to reunite into a single flow at the 1,600-foot elevation (6.3 miles from the bay. The flow again split into two forks—north and south—at the 300-foot) elevation (1.6 miles from the bay.) (USGS)

The 1881 lavas reached just north of the present University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo campus. After crossing the present Komohana and Kumukoa Streets, a very narrow section crossed what is now Mohouli Street, about 300 yards above the intersection with Kapiʻolani Street.

Several hundred homes are now built on pāhoehoe lavas of the 1881 flow and can easily be recognized by their ubiquitous “rock gardens” (no soils have yet formed on this flow). Kaumana Cave was formed at this time and was a major supply conduit for the lavas that threatened Hilo. (USGS)

“The lava stream surrounded a single kalo-plant, growing on an islet of eighteen inches in diameter, and on another one twice as broad, a single banana plant. They have survived the heat and are growing finely, the only green things left in the garden”. (Coan)

The people asked Keʻelikōlani (Princess Ruth) to intercede. The Hawaiian-language newspaper Ko Hawai‘i Pae Aina published a letter with the heading “Ka Pele ai Honua ma Hilo” (Pele, devourer of land at Hilo) that describes the immediate danger, “Hapalua Mile ka Mamao mai ke Koana aku” (the distance from town being only one half mile.) (Bishop Museum)

“Without delay a council, high and solemn, was held in Honolulu by the principal natives; and Princess Ruth, or Luka, as her name was in Hawaiian, a lineal descendant of Kamehameha the Great, the conqueror of all Hawaii, was dispatched to offer compelling sacrifices to the goddess”.

“(T)his six decades after the first American missionaries had come to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity, fifty years or so after the zealous Hawaiians had carved blocks of stone from coral reefs and dragged them inland, there to erect churches that stand to this day. … (T)he princess accordingly embarked on the Iwalani at Honolulu.”

“An innumerable throng saw her embark and sail from Honolulu for Kailua. … Other boats took the retainers, pigs, pigeons, and the remainder of the paraphernalia for the rites at the burning mountain, and the second mate, Kauhane, went on shore to supervise operations there.” (Cameron, 1928)

“The flood came on until all agreed that in two or three days more it would be pouring into our beautiful bay. On the 10th of August it was but one mile from the sea, and half a mile from Hilo town.” (Coan)

Keʻelikōlani offered traditional oli (chants) and hoʻokupu (tribute) to Pele and later reportedly camped at the foot of the flow. (Bishop Museum)

“Ruth did manage to perform the rites, assisted by many kahunas; she made her burnt offerings, which Pele gladly accepted. Perhaps the goddess hungered for roast pig; maybe she was overawed by the royal descent of Ruth; more probably Pele stood in terror of the mortal.”

“Whatever the explanation, the lava flow ceased.” (Cameron, 1928)

Dynamite explosives had been suggested as a means to divert lava flows threatening Hilo. (Lockwood & Torgerson) However, before that plan could be put into execution, the lava flow stopped – August 10, 1881. (Kuykendall)

May 20, 2026 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Pele’s Hair

“In the afternoon, Messrs. Thurston and Bishop walked out in a NW direction, till they reached the point that forms the northern boundary or the bay, on the eastern side of which Kairua (Kailua) is situated. It runs three or four miles into the sea; is composed entirely of lava …”

“… and was formed by an eruption from one of the large craters on the top of Mouna Huararai, (Hualālai,) which, about twenty-three years ago, inundated several villages, destroyed a number of plantations and extensive fish-ponds, filled up a deep bay twenty miles in length, and formed the present coast.”

“An Englishman, who has resided thirty-eight years in the islands, and who witnessed the above eruption, has frequently, told us he was astonished at the irresistible impetuosity of the torrent. Stone walls, trees, and houses, all gave way before it ….”

“Numerous offerings were presented, and many hogs, thrown alive into the stream, to appease the anger of the gods, by whom they supposed it was directed, and to stay its devastating course. All seemed unavailing, until one day the king Tamehameha (Kamehameha) … as the most valuable offering he could make, cut off part of his own hair, which was always considered sacred, and threw it into the torrent.”

“A day or two after, the lava ceased to flow. The gods, it was thought, were satisfied; and the king acquired no small degree of influence over the minds of the people, who, from this circumstance, attributed their escape from threatened destruction to his supposed interest with the deities of the volcanoes.” (Ellis, 1823)

Others did the same in offering hair to Pele. “This volcano, which has the name of Peli (Pele) from the goddess supposed to inhabit it, is also called by the natives, Kairauea Nui (Kilauea,) or the greater, and the extinguished crater, Kairauea in, or the little …”

“Night increased the magnificence, perhaps the horror, of the scene. The volcano caused … ‘a terrible light in the air.’ The roar occasioned by the escape of the pent up elements, and the fearful character of the surrounding scenery, suited with that light; and all impressed us with the sense of the present Deity …”

“No wonder, then, that the uninstructed natives had long worshipped, in this place, the mysterious powers of nature. Here it was that they supposed the gods of the Island had their favourite abodes, and that, from this centre of their power, they often shook the land, when it pleased them to pass under ground to visit the sea, and take delight in open places.”

“The first pair who arrived at the Island, with the animals and fruits necessary for their subsistence, met the fire gods, say they, on their first landing, and propitiated them by offerings of part of their provisions. …

“Hence no ohelo berry was eaten on Peli, till some had been offered to the goddess of the same name: the sandal-wood was not cut, nor the fern roots dug, without propitiating her by locks of hair, and often more precious things.”

“Frequently the hog and the dog were sacrificed to procure her favour; and never was the ground disturbed or any thing carried away from Kairauea.” (Byron, 1825)

But these offerings of hair to Pele are not the focus of this summary; this is about Pele’s Hair – a volcanic phenomenon that internationally carries the name of ‘Pele.’

Missionary Titus Coan describes Pele’s Hair: “All at once the scene changes, the central portion begins to swell and rise into a grayish dome, until it bursts like a gigantic bubble, and out rushes a sea of crimson fusion …”

“… which pours down to the surrounding wall with an awful seething and roaring, striking this mural barrier with fury, and with such force that its sanguinary jets are thrown back like a repulsed charge upon a battle-field, or tossed into the air fifty to a hundred feet high, to fall upon the upper rim of the pit in a hail-storm of fire.”

“This makes the filamentous vitrifaction called ‘Pele’s hair.’”

“The sudden sundering of the fusion into thousands of particles, by the force that thus ejects the igneous masses upward, and their separation when in this fused state, spins out vitreous threads like spun glass.”

“These threads are light, and when taken up by brisk winds, are often kept floating and gyrating in the atmosphere, until they come into a calmer stratum of air …”

“… when they fall over the surrounding regions, sometimes in masses in quiet and sheltered places. They are sometimes carried a hundred miles, as is proved by their dropping on ships at sea.”

“This ‘hair’ takes the color of the lava of which it is formed. Some of it is a dark gray, some auburn, or it may be yellow, or red, or of a brick color.” (Titus Coan)

Scientists say Pele’s hair is “volcanic glass that has been stretched into thin strands by the physical pulling apart of molten material during eruptions. Most commonly it forms during fire fountain activity.” (Batiza)

Thin strands of volcanic glass drawn out from molten lava have long been called Pele’s hair, named for Pele, the Hawaiian goddess of volcanoes.

A single strand, with a diameter of less than 0.5 mm, may be as long as 2 m. The strands are formed by the stretching or blowing-out of molten basaltic glass from lava, usually from lava fountains, lava cascades, and vigorous lava flows (for example, as pāhoehoe lava plunges over a small cliff and at the front of an ‘a‘a flow.)

Pele’s hair is often carried high into the air during fountaining, and wind can blow the glass threads several tens of kilometers from a vent. (USGS)

October 25, 2025 by Peter T Young 6 Comments

Ka Wai O Pele

“Probably the most striking scenic point about Kapoho is Green Lake, a beautiful body of deep green water occupying the crater called Waiapele, ‘Pele’s Lake.’” (Mid-Pacific Magazine, 1920)

Missionary William Ellis, at Kapoho, noted, a “cluster, apparently of hills, three or four miles round, and as many hundred feet high, with deep indented sides … (within it) a charming valley.”

“In the centre was an oval hollow, about half a mile across, and probably two hundred feet deep, at the bottom of which was a beautiful lake of brackish water, whose margin was in a high state of cultivation, planted with taro, bananas, and sugar-cane.”

“The steep, perpendicular rocks, forming the sides of the hollow, were adorned with tufts of grass, or blooming, pendulous plants; while, along the narrow and verdant border of the lake at the bottom, the bread-fruit, the kukui, and the ohia trees, appeared, with now and then a lowly native hut standing beneath their shade.”

“The placid surface of the lake, disturbed only by the boys and girls, diving and sporting in its waters; the serpentine walks among the luxuriant gardens along its margin; the tranquil occupations of the inhabitants, some weaving mats, others walking cheerfully up and down the winding paths among the steep rocks”

“But had tradition been silent, the volcanic nature of the rocks, the structure of the large basin, in which we were standing, and the deep hollow in the centre, which we were viewing, would have carried conviction to every beholder, that it had once been the seat of volcanic fires.”

“We asked several natives of the place, if they had any account of the king, in whose reign it had burned, or if they knew any songs, or traditions, in which it was stated how many kings had reigned in Hawaii, or how many chiefs had governed Puna, either since it first broke out, or since it became extinct; but they could give us no information on these subjects.”

“They told us the name of the place was Kapoho, (the sunken in,) and of the lake Ka wai a Pele, (the water of Pele;) and that it was one of the places, from which the volcanic goddess threw rocks and lava after Kahavari.”

“The saltness of the water in the extinguished volcano, proves the connection of the lake with the sea, from which it was about a mile distant; but we could not learn that it was at all affected by the rising or falling of the tides.” (Ellis, 1823)

In 1849, James Dana, an early explorer, mentioned in his geologic report a hot spring, “in a small crater between Kilauea and Kapoho Point.” In the same general area, Dr. Gordon Macdonald in 1950 noted a “small spring-fed pool at the foot of scarp. No Outflow” half a mile northwest of Puʻu Kukae. (Woodruff)

Green Lake “is a little pond, covering perhaps fifteen acres, of water which has precisely the same shade of muddy green you used to get in your box of water colors when you were a lad.”

“You remember, the shade you used to color the trees in the pictures in your school geography! It is remarkable that the pool should be there, in a waterless country, and the tree-clad slopes about the lake make a pretty picture, therefore the Green Lake is worth while.” (Mid-Pacific Magazine, 1912)

More recently, it was more commonly called ‘Green Lake,’ a crater lake that occupies part of the floor of Kapoho Crater. This cone in lower Puna was formed by magma erupting through groundwater 300-350 years ago. (USGS)

Then came the 2018 eruption … “Since eruptions began in early May on the Big Island, lava has covered nearly 8 square miles in lower Puna, taking out more than 150 homes and cutting access to neighborhoods.”

“And over the weekend, Hawaii Island lost an entire lake.”

“Green Lake, also known as Ka Wai a Pele, effectively vanished on Saturday [June 2, 2018] after lava flows caused all of the 400-year-old lake’s water to evaporate. Around 10 a.m., officials said that lava began entering the water basin, causing a massive tower of steam to rise from the area.”

“Later that afternoon, when authorities were able to evaluate the area, pure lava sat where Hawaii’s largest freshwater natural resource once stood.” (Hawaii News Now)

October 8, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

“Pele’s Grandson”

He was known as “Pele’s Grandson” to many – and “The Runt” to his boss, Thomas R Boles, Superintendent of the Hawaiʻi National Park (he was 5-foot 1-inch in height and weighed ninety-five pounds.) (NPS, 1953)

Alexander P Lancaster (aka Alex or Alec,) a Cherokee, was employed by Volcano House and Hawaiʻi Volcanoes Observatory, guided tourists to Kilauea’s active lava lake from 1885 to 1924. (Wright)

Lancaster was a firm believer in Pele and her powers; he took a proprietary interest in the volcanoes – thus the nickname. He enthralled thousands of visitors with his intimate knowledge of volcanoes.

When someone mentioned Vesuvius to him, his stock reply was, “Vesuvius is just an old man. Pele is sturdy on her job.” It was nothing short of a sacrilege to talk about other volcanoes in Alec’s presence. (NPS)

An interview with “Uncle George” Lycurgus Volcano House owner (on his one-hundredth birthday) reveals more on Pele. When asked if he had ever seen Pele, Lycurgus replied:

“Oh, yes. I tell you. I saw Pele, in the fire. There is a woman … you can see a woman, in the flames … she comes out and walks around … then she goes back in the fire … and prays ….”

“The Hawaiians believe in Pele. Certainly I believe in Pele, too. Pele belongs to the Islands. She will come to tell us what to do. She always comes when we need her. Pele is bound to come soon.” (Nimmo)

When Halemaʻumaʻu was inactive and business at the hotel was poor, Lycurgus decided to offer prayers and rituals at the volcano to coax the goddess back to the crater and thereby improve business at the hotel.

He and Lancaster “walked down to Halemaʻumaʻu and invoked some prayers to the volcano goddess. Following that, they tossed into the fire pit an Ohelo berry lei made by Lancaster … “

“As a final gesture, Lycurgus tossed in a bottle of gin which had been partially drained by him and Lancaster on the walk to the pit. More prayers followed and the two of them returned to the Volcano House for the night. Within hours after the men went to bed, the volcano began erupting.” (Nimmo)

“Alec Lancaster, the well-known guide at the crater, has made a trail to a ledge of pahoehoe, a distance of 200-feet from the brink, and takes down to that point those visitors who desire to make a closer inspection than can be made at the edge. So far not many have shown a willingness to accept Alec’s invitation.” (Evening Bulletin, June 15, 1902)

Thomas Augustus Jaggar, Jr was an American volcanologist; he founded the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory and directed it from 1912 to 1940.

“Lancaster, probably wound up each trip into Kilauea caldera with one pocket full of tips and another full of Cuban cigars – until Jaggar put him on the Observatory’s payroll as janitor, guide and general roustabout. Lancaster’s experiences close to Kilauea’s flowing and fountaining lava made him a good hand for Jaggar.” (USGS)

“Once again, in the interest of science, Madame Pele has been braved by the investigators living on the volcano’s brink for the purposes of studying systematically the vagaries of the fire goddess and of reducing her phenomena down to rules of cause and effect.”

“Last week, while the pit of Halemaʻumaʻu was in a state of unusual activity, with lava fountains playing, spatter cones forming, streams of liquid fire swelling in flows over the hardened crust…”

“Dr ES Shepherd, of the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution, and HO Wood, technical assistant of Professor Jaggar, accompanied by Alex Lancaster the veteran Volcano House guide, descended four hundred feet into the pit, crossed the hardened but heated lava floor and collected sufficient of the nascent gas from one of the open vents for analyses.”

“Rope ladders were used to descend the first one hundred and eighty feet of the pit, for which distance the walls are sheer. At this depth the walls were broken down and the intrepid scientists and their daring companion were able to scramble down the rest of the way to the fire level, over the smoking, crumbling lava.”

“During the greater part of their descent, the three were hidden from the view of those who tried to watch them from the pit’s rim by the swirling, opaque gases that swept in clouds over the surface of the lower levels. (Hawaiian Gazette, December 10, 1912)

Alec’s thirst for liquor was his undoing; he was dismissed from the Park in 1928. He spent his last years as a public ward in the Old Folks’ Home in Hilo. (NPS) (Reportedly born in 1861, Lancaster died in 1930.)

March 16, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Wahaʻula Heiau

No keia heiau oia ke kapu enaena.
(Concerning this heiau is the burning tabu.)

‘Enaena’ means ‘burning with a red hot rage.’ The heiau was so thoroughly ‘tabu,’ or ‘kapu,’ that the smoke of its fires falling upon any of the people or even upon any one of the chiefs was sufficient cause for punishment by death, with the body as a sacrifice to the gods of the temple. (Westervelt)

Oral traditions trace the origin of Hawaiian luakini temple construction to the high priest Pā’ao, who arrived in the islands in about the thirteenth century. He introduced several changes to Hawaiian religious practices that affected temple construction, priestly ritual, and worship practices.

Prior to his coming, the prayers, sacrifices, and other ceremonial activities that the high chief and his officiating priest performed could be observed by the congregation, who periodically responded as part of the ceremony.

After Pā’ao’s arrival, temple courtyards, which were sometimes built on hillsides to add to their massiveness, were enclosed with high stone walls, preventing the masses from participating as freely in the worship ceremonies.

In addition, new gods; stronger kapu; an independent, hereditary priesthood; wooden temple images; and human sacrifices became established parts of the religious structure. Pā’ao erected the first luakini (Wahaula) at Puna, Hawaiʻi, followed by Moʻokini Heiau at Kohala. These structures signaled a new era in Hawaiian religious practices. (NPS)

On the southeast coast of Hawaiʻi near Kalapana is one of the largest, oldest and best preserved heiau. Its walls are several feet thick and in places ten to twelve feet high. It is divided into rooms or pens, in one of which still lies the huge sacrificial stone upon which victims – sometimes human – were slain before the bodies were placed as offerings. (Westervelt, 1915)

“At our visit to the scene we were shown the small cove, deep down the jagged bluffs of Puna’s coast line, at the southern end of Wahaʻula premises, where the bones of the slain were washed, and to this day is known as Holoinaiwi.” (Thrum, 1904)

This heiau is now called Wahaʻula (red-mouth). In ancient times it was known as Ahaʻula (the red assembly), possibly denoting that at times the priests and their attendants wore red mantles in their processions or during some part of their sacred ceremonies. (Westervelt)

“The Heiau of Wahaʻula is built on an ʻaʻa flow, and the ascent to it is by terraces. Upon the first terrace the female members of the royal family brought their offerings which were taken by the priests. Beyond this first terrace no female was allowed to pass.”

“Two more terraces brings one to the enclosure or temple, in the shape of a quadrangle 132 feet long, by 72 feet wide. A stone wall encloses the temple, 6 feet high and 4 feet wide. The main entrance faces the East, flanked on either side by two smaller entrances. Immediately in front of this entrance stand the remains of the old temple, which was destroyed by the ʻaʻa flow on which the present one stands.”

“Across the southern end extends a stone platform some 3 feet high built in the shape of two semi-circles connected by a straight platform. Between these semi-circles was placed the presiding deity, and on either hand were placed the offerings of fruits, etc., while immediately in front, on a small raised platform were placed the human sacrifices, which were always slain in the main entrance to the heiau.”

“Immediately in front of this altar for human sacrifices, and extending across the enclosure, stood the priests’ house. sacred to them alone. In the rear of this was the royal house, where the members of the royal family assembled during the days devoted to the sacrifices. The rest of the enclosure was paved.” (Thrum)

“Water-worn pebbles were carried from the beach and strewn over the floor, making a smooth place for the naked feet of the temple dwellers to pass without injury from the sharp-edged lava. Rude grass huts built on terraces were the abodes of the priests and high chiefs who visited the places of sacrifice.”

“Elevated, flat-topped piles of stones were built at one end of the temple for the chief idols and the sacrifices placed before them. Simplicity of detail marked every step of temple erection.” (Westervelt)

“(I)in the original enclosure of the heiau of Wahaʻula was a sacred grove, said to contain one or more specimens of every tree growing on the Hawaiian group, a number of which, or their descendants, had survived when he visited the place in 1869. … It was built in the quadrangular or parallelogram form which characterized all the heiaus built under and after the religious regime introduced by Pāʻao.” (Fornander)

Beyond the heiau, on the makai side of the trail, is pointed out the footprint of Niheu, a demi-god, as well as the mark of an arrow which he shot at another demi-god who came to fight him. Further west, makai of the place where the trail turns mauka, is Kamoamoa, where the ranch driving pens are.

Here are two wells with fair water, and also a fine natural arch by the sea. Here are also a few interesting rock carvings. The most easily found of these is about a hundred yards from the paddock extension towards Kalapana, and may be located by following the line of this extension’s makai wall in an easterly direction.

The trail is straight, with a bad grade, but paved, until it has reached well up the bluff, where it passes the Pea house, the last habitation before the Crater Hotel is reached. From Pea’s it is a good eight miles to the Makaopuhi crater. The trail is narrow, passes through splendid forest, and is, though seldom used, quite easily followed. (Kinney, 1913)

“Tradition credits a rebuilding of the temple to Imaikalani, a famous chief of Puna, and Kaʻū, in the time of Keawenui-a-umi, in the sixteenth century. It was repaired again in the time of Kalaniʻōpuʻu, about 1770, and in the time of Kamehameha I, it had its final renovation.” (Thrum)

“This was the last heiau destroyed when the ancient tabus and ceremonial rites were overthrown by the chiefs just before the coming of Christian missionaries. At that time the grass houses of the priests were burned and in these raging flames were thrown the wooden idols back of the altars and the bamboo huts of the soothsayers and the rude images on the walls, with everything combustible which belonged to the ancient order of worship. Only the walls and rough stone floors were left in the temple. (Westervelt)

Kīlauea’s ongoing Puʻu ʻŌʻō eruption started on January 3, 1983 when ground fissures opened up and “curtains of fire” (long thin fountains of molten lava) issued from a 3½-miles long discontinuous fissure system in the remote rainforest of the middle east rift zone of the volcano.

Since then, about 500-acres have been added to the Big Island (that volume of lava could have filled 1.5-million swimming pools. The coastal highway has been closed since 1987, as lava flows covered 8 miles to as great a depth as 80 feet. 214-homes were destroyed.

“The apprehensions uniformly entertained by the natives, of the fearful consequences of Pele’s anger, prevented their paying very frequent visits to the vicinity of her abode; and when, on their inland journeys, they had occasion to approach Kirauea, they were scrupulously attentive to every injunction of her priests, and regarded with a degree of superstitious veneration and awe the appalling spectacle which the crater and its appendages presented.”

“The violations of her sacred abode, and the insults to her power, of which we had been guilty, appeared to them, and to the natives in general, acts of temerity and sacrilege; and, notwithstanding the fact of our being foreigners, we were subsequently threatened with the vengeance of the volcanic deity, under the following circumstances.” (Ellis, 1831)

The Wahaʻula Heiau was threatened three times in 1989 and once in 1990, but the lava flowed only up to the walls before diverting around them, but destroyed the visitor center and related facilities (built by the National Park Service in 1964, was destroyed by lava in June 1989.) However, a subsequent 1997 flow breached the walls and covered the heiau. (star-bulletin)