Volcano | Page 5 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

December 9, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Scorching Post Cards

According to Thrum, the first white man to stay overnight in Kilauea Caldera was CS Bartow, the postmaster of Lahaina on Maui, visiting Hawaii. Bartow suggested the nighttime excursion to his fellow travelers, and while they decided against the idea, the postmaster could not be dissuaded.

In 1898, Lorrin Thurston owner of Volcano House and head of the Hawai‘i Promotion Committee (forerunner to the Hawai‘i Visitors and Convention Bureau) worked closely with the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company to create an excursion business from Honolulu to his hotel at Kīlauea.

Although he sold his interest in Volcano House to hotelier George Lycurgus (1858–1960) in 1904, Thurston continued to promote Kīlauea and Hawai‘i’s other natural sites.

Thurston helped with the establishment of the Hawaiʻi National Park, an entity to encompass both Kīlauea and Haleakalā. Hawai‘i’s new National Park, established August 1, 1916, was the thirteenth in the new system and the first in a US territory. (Chapman)

Visiting Hawaii’s volcanoes in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries – both before and after their designation as a National Park in 1916 – was an adventurous experience.

From Hilo, travelers had the choice of two routes to the volcanic craters; they could travel the entire thirty miles via automobile or take the railroad for twenty-two miles and a car for the remaining eight. The tourists’ destination at the crater was often Volcano House.

The majority of guidebooks from the late nineteenth century list the best time to hike the caldera as midafternoon because it provided visitors with both safe sightseeing in daylight and a closer look at Halema‘uma‘u Crater’s lava glowing in the evening.

Most travelers preferred visiting the crater in guided groups, and – armed with food, supplies, and postcards provided by Volcano House – trekked down the caldera’s well-marked trail and enjoyed lava-formed wonders. (Chisholm)

“Visitors to Kilauea Caldera used to take sport in lowering sticks with food or souvenirs into the fissures. Some enjoyed a dinner of eggs and potatoes cooked by the volcano, while others scorched postcards to mail back home.” (Alice Kim)

“A unique entertainment tendered us was a dinner served within five feet of the pit. Lumber to build table and benches had been brought down on the backs of horses.”

“An excellent meal was served, everything being cooked at the hot cracks on the crater. This is a favorite method of visitors, many of whom make steaming hot coffee over the cracks …” (Congressional Party in Hawaii, May 1907)

“[T]he sulphur and steam cracks in the crust were especially hot, prompting tourists to lower sticks holding food and souvenirs into the fissures. Many tours enjoyed a dinner of eggs and potatoes cooked by the volcano’s heated vents, while others brewed coffee”. (Postal Museum)

“These cracks can be found at many places for some distance around the pit. … Nothing quite so elaborate had ever been attempted here before.”

“The desolate grandeur of the place was impressive and the weird surroundings made a scene such as one will seldom look upon in a lifetime.” (Congressional Party in Hawaii, May 1907)

“In letters written about his own experience at Kilauea in 1907, Pennsylvania Representative Ernest Acheson remarked that, ‘An excellent meal was served, everything being cooked at the hot cracks on the crater … and the weird surroundings made a scene such as one will seldom look upon in a lifetime.’” (Postal Museum)

October 5, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hawaiian Volcano Research Association

“Keep and publish careful records, invite the whole world of science to co-operate, and interest the business man.” (Jaggar, 1913)

In contemplating the formation of a volcano observatory in Hawai‘i, Thomas Jaggar enlisted support from the Chamber of Commerce and the leading citizens of Honolulu.

In 1909, subscriptions were started by personal interview through the agency of Mr. Thurston and volunteer solicitors, after a lecture on volcanoes by Professor Jaggar, delivered at the University Club of Honolulu. A generous response came from a number of organizations and individuals.

The Chamber of Commerce appointed a committee to seek subscriptions in June, 1909. These were: Charles M. Cooke, Ltd., C. H. Cooke, Acting Director; Inter-Island Steam Navigation Co., Ltd., James A. Kennedy, General Manager; Mr. W. G. Irwin; Kilauea Volcano House, Ltd., E. W. Campbell, Treasurer; Hilo Rail Road Co., Lorrin A. Thurston, General Manager; Hawaiian Promotion Committee; Mr. George Wilcox; Mr. Aug. Knudsen and the Bishop Museum.

The founding of the Volcano Observatory and the formation of the group of subscribers called the “Research Association,” were themselves evolved productions of the inspiring work of early investigators, as well as of the natural intellectual stimulus created in man by the unexplained Kilauea lake of boiling nebulous flux.

October 5, 1911, at a well-attended meeting in the University Club, Honolulu, an informal organization of the Research Association was adopted and placed in the hands of a committee consisting of L. A. Thurston, chairman; A. F. Judd, representing the trustees of the Bishop Museum; President J. W. Gilmore, representing the College of Hawaii; C. H. Cooke, treasurer of the association; J. A. Kennedy.

Mr. Thurston at this meeting pointed out that there should be no break in the collection of records at Kilauea so well started by Mr. Perret, and suggested that a committee of five be appointed with power to act, to draw up a form of organization and to solicit subscriptions to help cover daily operations.

The persons who signed the subscription list of 1909 had been interviewed and had mostly expressed themselves as willing to renew their subscriptions. He reviewed the history of the observatory movement and then suggested that a voluntary, unincorporated, local organization be formed, to secure funds to carry on volcanic research; such funds to be administered and expended by an unpaid executive committee of five to be annually elected by the association.

The meeting of October, 1911 put the money-raising in the hands of the committee of five, and the estate of CM Cooke, Ltd. became guarantor of a fund of $5,000 annually, the actual subscriptions in Hawaii at first amounting to some three-quarters of that sum.

Mr. Jaggar by personal interviews raised $2,800 additional in 1912, assisted by a new subscription blank approved July 10, 1912, by the Honolulu Chamber of Commerce. In January of that year he had raised $1,785 in Hilo through the energetic assistance of Mr. Demosthenes Lycurgus, with the approval of the Hilo Board of Trade, this money being for the Observatory building.

A few small gifts have been made for special purposes such as the motorcar and certain specimens destined for the Bishop Museum.

The subscriptions are partly for five years, but many are renewable from year to year. Their motto was Ne plus haustae aut obrutae urbes (No more shall the cities be destroyed).

President Gilmore mentioned the many unsolved problems at the volcanoes and the necessity for continuous and concerted effort to collect data. He pointed out the extensive instrumental equipment which would be necessary and agreed for the College of Hawaii to give such assistance as its rules would permit.

Mr. Judd expressed great interest on the part of the Bishop Museum and undertook to investigate thoroughly what funds could be used to this end under the trust deed of that Institution.

Mr. C. H. Cooke, president of the Bank of Hawaii, deplored the multiplicity of organizations in Honolulu and expressed the belief that it would be to the welfare of all concerned if the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) would take the scientific responsibility of the work.

Governor Frear cited two main propositions as involved in the plan of work of the proposed Volcano Research Association, one concerning the scientific value of the work and the other the advertising of the Islands to the world.

He did not know whether the government could assist but it might profitably be brought before the legislature. He thought the project would be heartily endorsed by the Hawaiian members.

Mr. T. Clive Davies expressed the hope that the scientific motive would greatly dominate the publicity idea as he feared the “blighting hand of commercialism” would seriously interfere with good research.

The net result of this meeting was to establish an association for the private subscription of money to volcano research. Through this, the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory was formed.

According to its constitution, the name of this Association shall be the Hawaiian Volcano Research Association. The objects of this Association shall be:

To encourage and promote investigation of and research concerning volcanoes and volcanic phenomena, and all matters connected therewith or incidental thereto;
To establish and maintain an observatory at the Volcano of Kilauea, with subordinate stations at other points, from which investigation and research may be conducted, and at which records may be made and kept for the information of all, subject to the rules of the Association;
To invite scientific institutions and observers to make use of the buildings, apparatus and facilities of the Association, subject to the rules of the Association, and, so far as possible, to assist such institutions and observers in carrying on their work;
To promote the publication and dissemination of knowledge concerning volcanology and allied subjects, and to accumulate literature, photographs, models, maps and specimens, relating thereto, for the information of all, subject to the rules of the Association.

Membership was open to Any person, corporation, association or institution signing an application blank, whose name may be approved by the Board of Directors and who shall pay the dues prescribed by the Constitution, shall thereby become a member of the Association. (The membership dues shall be $5.00 per annum, payable annually in advance.)

Those who contribute to the support of the Association other than or in addition to the membership dues, shall be known as ”Patrons” of the Association.

The Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO), in operation from July 1, 1912, under the direction of the Department of Geology of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in part, received initial funding from trustees of the Estates of Edward and Caroline Whitney.

The Whitney Fund provided $25,000 to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where the principal and interest of the fund was for the conduct of research or teaching in geophysics.

MIT cooperated with the Hawaiian Volcano Research Association by becoming its largest subscriber for the five years, through the income of the Whitney fund and other payments. The Research Association’s funding support continued for several decades.

By December 1915, with Jaggar having worked in Hawai‘i for three years, the Research Association and MIT sent him to Washington DC to appeal to Congress to take over HVO as a government institution. In addition, the governor of Hawai‘i and the Honolulu Chamber of Commerce asked him to continue to push for the establishment of a national park. (Moniz Namakura)

The US Geological Survey (USGS) has operated HVO continuously since 1947. Before then, HVO was under the administration of various Federal agencies – the US Weather Bureau, at the time part of the Department of Agriculture, from 1919 to 1924; the USGS, which first managed HVO from 1924 to 1935; and the National Park Service from 1935 to 1947.

It currently operates under the direction of the USGS Volcano Science Center, which now supports five volcano observatories covering six US areas – Hawaiʻi (HVO), Alaska and the Northern Mariana Islands (Alaska Volcano Observatory), Washington and Oregon (Cascades Volcano Observatory), California (California Volcano Observatory), and the Yellowstone region (Yellowstone Volcano Observatory). (Information here is from various documents of USGS, HVO and NPS.)

June 2, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Volcano Golf Course

The records of the Māhele ‘Āina note, Victoria Kamāmalu, a granddaughter of Kamehameha I, claimed and received the ‘ili of Keauhou during the Māhele. Victoria Kamāmalu died on May 29th, 1866, at the age of 28 years.

Her lands were inherited by her father, Mataio Kekūanāoʻa. Kekūanāoʻa died two years later, on November 24th, 1868. His lands – including those he’d inherited from his own children and relatives – were inherited by his daughter, Luta ‘Ruth’ Keʻelikōlani (Princess Ruth, half sister of V. Kamāmalu).

Keʻelikōlani died on May 24, 1883. Her lands – including those she inherited from her own father, siblings, husband, and relatives – were inherited by her cousin, Bernice Pauahi Bishop.

Bernice Pauahi Bishop (Pauahi), daughter of Laura Konia and Abner Paki, inherited the lands of her parents – Abner Paki, who died on June 13, 1855, leaving Pauahi his six (6) Māhele lands and numerous parcels; and Laura Konia, who died on July 2, 1857, leaving Pauahi her ten (10) Māhele lands.

Pauahi also inherited the six (6) Māhele lands of her aunt, ‘Akahi, who died on October 8,1877; and the lands of her cousin, Keʻelikōlani on May 24, 1883 – these lands included the ‘ili of Keauhou, which embrace Kīlauea.

Bernice Pauahi Bishop died on October 15, 1884, her combined lands were dedicated to the establishment of the trust forming the Bishop Estate and the subsequent forming of Kamehameha Schools.

On June 4, 1920, Bishop Estate agreed to a trade with the Territory of Hawaii, exchanging approximately 12,035 acres of Keauhou for Government land at Mohokea, Ka‘ū.

The agreement excluded unrecorded leases between the Estate and the Volcano House Company; OT Shipman (for Keauhou Ranch); the Kilauea Military Camp and Territorial Guard; the County of Hawai‘i; and eleven individuals, holding leasehold residential lots.

The agreement of 1920 provided the Territory of Hawaii, with the lands necessary to form the Kilauea section of Hawaii National Park. The Territory subsequently transferred the Keauhou-Kilauea parcel to the United States Government in 1922. (Maly)

In 1863, the first formal lease of Keauhou was granted by Chiefess Kamāmalu and her father, M. Kekūanaoʻa, to F.B. Swain. By 1865 the lease had transferred to C.E. Richardson, who with partners, Wm. Reed, Geo. Jones, and L. Kaina, who in addition to further developing ranching and a pulu harvesting business at Keauhou, also developed a new a Volcano House.

The facility served visitors to the Volcano, and those traveling between Kaʻū and Hilo or Puna. The growing facilities were made in a mixture of Hawaiian and western architecture. The first, all-wooden Volcano House, was built in 1877, and remains not far from where it was originally built, to the present-day.

In the years leading up to establishment of the National Park, the National Guard of Hawaiʻi and the United States Army established a military reserve (Kīlauea Military Camp) in Keauhou, for purposes of training, recreation and health. The Volcano House Hotel also secured a lease from the Trustees of the Bishop Estate to develop the Volcano Golf Course. (Maly)

The oldest on Hawaii island, Volcano golf course began in 1921 as three holes marked by stakes. (VGCC) “[T]he [initial] golf course was pasture. At that time [Arthur Brown had Keauhou Ranch and they] ran the milk cows, horses and cattle and all that. In the golf course they ran what they called their working horses and the milk cows.”

“And the golf course … the putting area was all fenced off so the cattle wouldn’t bother that. Then of course the biggest part of the ranch ran up Mauna Loa side.” (Morgan Arthur Brown Oral History Interview)

Then, in 1922, they constructed a 9-hole course, “a real golf course.” “It all came to pass when the management of the Volcano House, an up-to-date hostelry, maintained for the convenience of the … tourists, suddenly realized that it was not living up to the prescribed reputation of being up-to-date inasmuch as it had failed to provide, like other first-class tourists’ hotels, a golf course.”

“True its chief reason for existence is the Volcano, but the Englishman and his sense of honor, the hotel management felt that it could not conscientiously permit the establishment to be broadcasted as a hotel of the first-class unless it sported all the emendations credited to other first-class hotels.”

“And so, in taking stock of the Volcano House’s short comings, with was disclosed that the only thing of note which appeared to be lacking was a golf course.”

“[O]n a recent Sunday a nine-hole links was formally thrown open to those who cared to risk a few golf balls. Risk is hardly the word. Sacrifice would be better, as the course is dotted here and there with pukas (lava holes) and, although they have been wired over, the balls have an exasperating habit of slipping under the wire.”

“Then, again, if the golfer happens to be a particularly strong-armed individual, he is apt to send one skidding into the nineteenth hole – in this instance the crater itself.”

“On the other hand, the flow of lava from the crater has provided natural hazards such as bunkers and traps and the chap engaged to lay pit the course really didn’t have such a hard job of it. In fact, the course is the only one of its kind today and is certainly a unique one.”

“As everybody knows, golf requires keen nerves and concentration of mind and muscle and the ordinary golfer who attempts the volcano course after the first time usually encounters opposition from an unexpected quarter. As the volcano is in a state of constant activity, gas and steam occasionally and suddenly issue from the pukas.” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 11, 1922)

“The new golf links in the section adjacent to the tree-molds are already proving popular and offer a sporting nine holes that will arouse the keenest skill of the most inveterate player.”

“The golf links, which have been laid out at the expense of the Kilauea Volcano House so will not be run for profit. A small green fee is being charged and it is hoped that in due course.”

“As the links become better known, this will be sufficient to pay the cost of a permanent attendant and to erect something in the nature of a shelter-house for the players in the event of showers.” (Star Bulletin, June 10, 1922)

From this humble beginning, the course finally grew to an 18-hole layout two and half decades later (1946). C Brewer acquired the course in 1968 and their renovations included a redesign by legendary golf course architect Jack Snyder. C Brewer also oversaw the construction of a $200,000 clubhouse, which was damaged by fire in 2019. (VGCC)

Kamehameha Schools found someone to take over the lease for the Volcano Golf Course and Country Club. In 2020, the previous lessee of the 156-acre golf course unexpectedly abandoned the property four years before the termination of the lease. (Hawaii Tribune Herald)

November 21, 2021 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Isabella Bird, Estes Park … and Hawaiʻi

“She was continuously being reminded of experiences in the Sandwich Islands and the event of her travels seemed to have been the ascent of the volcano of Kilauea” … she wanted to climb Long’s Peak (near Estes Park, Colorado.) (Mills)

Whoa … let’s look back.

Isabella Bird was born in England in 1831. Her father was a Church of England minister. She was very sick as a child and she spent most of her life struggling with various illnesses. In 1850 Bird had an operation to remove a tumor from her spine, which was only partially successful.

Her doctor recommended that she travel; so, in 1854, when she was just 23 her father gave her 100 pounds and said she could visit family in the US until her money ran out. Bird headed to America, and then published her first book about the experience in 1856.

This was just the beginning of her travels, she couldn’t stand the thought of being cooped up at home, she just wanted to travel and write. So she traveled to Canada, then Scotland and Australia.

Bird then spent six months in the Sandwich Islands (Hawaiʻi) – the title to another of her books – she climbed an active volcano and then travelled to Colorado. (Walsh)

First, her impressions of Hawaiʻi …

“I was travelling for health, when circumstances induced me to land on the group (Sandwich Islands,) and the benefit which I derived from the climate tempted me to remain for nearly seven months.”

“During that time the necessity of leading a life of open air and exercise as a means of recovery, led me to travel on horseback to and fro through the islands, exploring the interior, ascending the highest mountains, visiting the active volcanoes and remote regions which are known to few even of the residents, living among the natives, and otherwise seeing Hawaiian life in all its phases.”

“I had so completely lived the island life, and acquainted myself with the existing state of the country, as to be rather a kamaʻāina than a stranger”. (Bird, 1875)

“The undeserved and unexpected kindness shown me here, as everywhere on these islands, renders my last impressions even more delightful than my first (“Bright blossom of a summer sea! Fair Paradise of the Pacific!”)

“The people are as genial as their own sunny skies, and in more frigid regions I shall never sigh for the last without longing for the first. … Farewell for ever, my bright tropic dream! Aloha nui to Hawaii-nei!” (Bird)

“The open-air life is most conducive to health, and the climate is absolutely perfect, owing to its equability and purity. Whether the steady heat of Honolulu, the languid airs of Hilo, the balmy breezes of Onomea, the cool bluster of Waimea, or the odorous stillness of Kona, it is always the same.”

“The grim gloom of our anomalous winters, the harsh malignant winds of our springs, and the dismal rains and overpowering heats of our summers, have no counterpart in the endless spring-time of Hawaiʻi.” (Bird)

While in the Islands, Bird learned about a place that supposedly was “the most beautiful country in all of the Americas”. She set out for Colorado, heading to the mountain town of Estes Park.

Gold had been discovered in Colorado in 1859. Among the thousands of adventurers who joined the rush was a Missouri native named Joel Estes. Joel moved his wife Patsy and their four other children to the mountains year-round in 1863. His son Milton had married and fathered two sons by then. The first known white child born in Estes Park was Milton’s third son in February, 1865.

The word “park” was in common usage at that time to describe an open area. William Byers, editor and publisher of the Rocky Mountain News, visited in September, 1864 to attempt a climb of Longs Peak. He wrote an account of his trip which included hospitality extended to him by the Estes family and extolled the virtues of “Estes’ Park.” (Estes Valley Library)

Like the draw of visitors to the natural wonders of Hawaiʻi, Estes Park drew guests to see the mountain wilderness. After several sales of the property there, the 4th Earl of Dunraven arrived in late-December 1872. He opened the area’s first resort, the Estes Park Hotel.

It was about that time the Isabella Bird visited the valley. As with her other adventures, Bird wrote a memoir of their travels. Bird had seen Long’s Peak on first arriving in Estes Park “rising above (the other peaks) in unapproachable grandeur”. (Long’s Peak is named for Major Stephen H Long who came to the mountains on a government scientific expedition in the summer of 1820.)

Fairly soon after her arrival, Bird ascended Long’s Peak with a local guide. Despite her bragging of physical feats and shows of courage elsewhere in her narrative, the difficulty of the climb to Long’s Peak seems to have mastered Bird. She writes: “‘Jim’ dragged me up, like a bale of goods, by sheer force of muscle”. (DeVine)

“I have dropped into the very place I have been seeking, but in everything it exceeds all my dreams… The scenery is the most glorious I have ever seen, and is above us, around us, at every door.” (Bird, A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains)

Bird’s published letters and book were the first thorough account of a tourist experience in the area that later became Rocky Mountain National Park, and she praised everything from the cool temperatures to the brilliant sunsets and the dark evergreens. (NPS)

Considering the influence of the book that told the story of her travels in Colorado, Bird might easily merit the label ‘Mother’ of Rocky Mountain National Park. (The Rocky Mountain National Park was officially formed in 1915.)

Bird’s book sold like hotcakes, mostly in the eastern US and Britain, where a reading public just becoming interested in wilderness travel and conservation was hungry for news of far-flung scenery. (NPS) By the middle of the 1880s, there were sometimes 200 tourists a summer in Estes Park.

A giant boost in tourism to Estes Park came after the turn of the century with the arrival of Freelan Oscar Stanley in 1903 (he was co-inventor with his brother of the Stanley Steamer.)

Impressed by the beauty of the valley and grateful for the improvement of his health, he decided to invest his money – and himself – in the future of Estes Park. The first requirement was a first-class hotel; so, in 1909 he opened the Stanley Hotel. (NPS)

(A later guest to Estes Park and the Stanley Hotel was Stephen King (in room #217.) The story of the Torrence family and the Overlook Hotel is one of the most well-known in horror (“The Shining.”) The work of fiction was inspired by the Stanley.)

Bird stayed in Colorado for a little while before going home to England; and then a marriage offer that she didn’t want inspired her to travel throughout Japan, China, Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia. She eventually succumbed and married an Edinburgh-based doctor John Bishop.

Bird has been featured in journals, magazines and books. She has inspired plays, and even during her lifetime she was a legend. She wrote over a dozen books and hundreds of articles. (Walsh)

Again, of Hawaiʻi, it “is at last, as it was at first, Paradise in the Pacific, a blossom of a summer sea.” (Bird)

October 22, 2021 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Bombing the River of Fire

Like most Hawaiian eruptions, the eruptive activity was immediately preceded by a swarm of earthquakes, followed by tremor. Mauna Loa (“Long Mountain”) began erupting at 6:20 pm on November 21, 1935.

The eruption started with a curtain of fountains near North Pit within the summit caldera, Mokuʻāweoweo. The vents migrated 2-miles down the northeast rift zone.

During the six days of the main event, fissures opened up along the northeast rift zone of the mountain, fountaining lava 200- to 300-feet into the air.

On November 26, the summit eruption died and the northeast rift activity was reduced to a single vent at the 11,400-foot elevation. A small vent also opened up further below on the north flank of the mountain at the 8,600-foot elevation. (USGS)

Lava flows from Mauna Loa were generally fast-moving and voluminous. Lava moved relentlessly at a rate of five-miles each day; it pooled up between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa at about where the Saddle Road is situated.

The ponded lava eventually began to follow the lay of the land, a natural drainage … Then, things “got interesting.” Lava was heading directly toward Hilo. (USGS)

Dr. Thomas A Jaggar Jr, the government volcanologist, estimated that the flow would reach Hilo by January 9, 1936. He suggested using dynamite to collapse lava tubes near the source of the flow in order to stop or divert it.

Explosives were first suggested as a means to divert lava flows threatening Hilo during the eruption of 1881. However, Jaggar’s plan of mule teams hiking the explosives up the mountain would take far too long – the lava flows were moving a mile a day.

Guido Giacometti, a friend of Jaggar, had suggested using US Army Air Corps bombers to precisely deliver explosives. Jaggar agreed, and the call was made.

The US Army Air Corps approved, and the mission and plans to strategically bomb Mauna Loa were set into motion. Lieutenant Colonel George Smith Patton was called on to oversee the Army operation. (He’s the same Patton who would go on to WWII fame.)

Lava tubes are cooled and hardened outer crusts of lava which provide insulation for the faster-flowing, molten rock inside. Such a conduit enables lava to move faster and farther.

The theory was bombs would destroy the lava tubes, robbing lava of an easy transport channel and exposing more of the lava to the air, slowing and cooling it further. (BBC)

On December 26, 1935, six Keystone B-3A bombers of the 23d Bomb Squadron and four Keystone LB-6A light bombers from the 72d Bomb Squadron joined the rendezvous circle in the predawn darkness off Diamond Head, and then headed to Hilo.

Jaggar briefed the crews on the methods he had in mind to divert the lava flow. He then flew over the volcano to assess the flows and select the right points for bombing.

8:30 am, December 27, 1935, the first five bombers departed on the bombing mission. (A second flight of five aircraft was planned for the afternoon.) Each plane carried two 300-pound practice bombs (for practice and sighting,) as well as two 600-pound Mk I demolition bombs (355 pounds of TNT each.)

The bombers opened formation and fell into a huge circle for a follow-the-leader dummy run over the target area. They were flying at about 12,500-feet, not far above the 8,600-foot altitude of the volcano’s flows.

As the lead pilot tipped the control column forward for his run he lowered the wheels, so that by the time he neared the clump of koa trees which served as reference point his plane would be moving only a little faster than the 65-mph landing speed.

‘OK?’ he called to his bombardier as they began their climb after passing over the flow. Standard radio-voice procedure was unneeded. … ‘OK,’ the bombardier grunted. (Johnson)

Five of the twenty bombs struck molten lava directly, most of the others impacted solidified lava along the flow channel margins; one of them turned out a dud.

“Colonel William C Capp, a pilot who bombed the lower target, reported direct hits on the channel, observing a sheet of red, molten rock that was thrown up to about 200′ elevation and that flying debris made small holes in his lower wing.”

“Bombs that impacted on solidified, vesicular pāhoehoe along the flow margin produced craters averaging 6.7-m diameters and 2.0-m depth….” (Swopes)

“Pilots observed that several bombs collapsed thin lava tube roofs, although in no case was sufficient roof material imploded into the tube to cause blockage.”

Jagger wrote that “the violent release of lava, of gas and of hydrostatic pressures at the source robbed the lower flow of its substance, and of its heat.”

The lava stopped flowing on January 2, 1936. The effectiveness of the lava bombing is disputed by some volcanologist. (USGS)

Here’s a link to a video of the Army bombing runs in 1935. (Lots of information here from Army, USGS, hawaii-gov, 4GFC, Johnson, Lockwood & Torgerson, Swopes and This Day in Aviation History.)

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675069574_bomb-Mauna-Loa_divert-lava_Keystone-B-3A_Keystone-LB-6A_United-States-fliers

Three Keystone B6As of 20th Bombardment Squadron, 2d Bomb Group, release their bombs on a practice mission

Plume from a test bombing of an old lava flow on Mauna Loa, performed in 1975

Lieutenant General Patton in 1935, prior to World War II

Keystone B-3A Bomber of the type used in the bombing of the volcano above Hilo in 1935

Dr. Thomas Jaggar and wife, Isabel Maydwell – 1917

Advancing lava flow, December 1935. (USGS)

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