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| Tephra or light weight volcanic rock and ash, covers this car in Hawaii after a Kilauea eruption sent debris into populated areas. |
This rain, in Hawaii, was rocks.
The uber-active Kilauea erupted again last Saturday, pushing fountains of lava 1,000 feet into the air.
But what goes up must come down. And people around the park ended up enduring a tephra storm.
Tephra is rocks and ash ejected from a volcano. Kilauea regularly discharges both lava and tephra, but the material usually lands on areas that are too dangerous for people. Saturday, unusually light winds made the tephra fall in populated areas near the volcano.
The debris fell on summit overlooks, trails, roads and even some residential areas. A section of Route 11 was closed.
'Some debris close to the size of a grapefruit was reported in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, including at Uekahuna, the Steam Vents, Volcano House and Keanakako'i, where the rocks were reported to be still hot when they fell.
'I haven't seen this one yet. This is uncharted territory for the Volcano Village,' said Eli Schonbrod, general manager for the Lanikai Brewing Company.
Colleen Gifford, a cashier at the Kilauea General Store, has lived on Hawaii Island for 40 years, and she she has 'never, ever seen it like this.'"
Some very small tephra - basically bits of ash - was spotted as far away as Hilo, more than 25 miles away.
Video showed what looked like a black hailstorm, thunking down on car roofs, and littering roadways, parking lots, lawn and roofs with what looked like millions of pieces of crumbled black paper.
Tephra is more light weight than rocks, so it wasn't smashing cars and roofs. It was kind of remotely a storm of falling Brillo pads. But tepha can be sharp, pointy enough to scratch paint. A few people who were out in the tephra storm were scratched enough to bleed slightly.
Of course, the tephra made a big mess. The day after the eruption, people were seen sweeping and shoveling piles of it away. Plows had to clear one section of a road as if there were a tropical snowstorm. Many roofs remained littered with the stuff. It'll probably come down from the roofs the next time it gets windy or it rains.
Although more Kilauea eruptions are inevitable, the tephra is unlikely to be a problem again. Almost always, trade winds veer this stuff away from people, as mentioned. This was basically just a one-off.
Videos
News report of what it all looked and sounded like. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below, click on that.
Cleanup from the eruption looked like it was quite a chore. Again, click on this link or if you see the image below, click on that.
