Several other lava flows from Mauna Loa’s SWRZ, including in 1868, 1887, and 1950, have also traveled quickly through this region, crossing roads and entering the ocean, sometimes within a matter of hours of the vent opening. The village of Miloliʻi and its boat access were narrowly missed by the 1926 flow. The 19 lava flows would have cut Highway 11 and caused severe disruptions for current residents. During both eruptions, lava flows reached the ocean and destroyed Hawaiian coastal villages (Alika and Hoʻōpūloa).
The 1916 eruption was followed in relatively rapid succession by Mauna Loa’s 19 SWRZ eruptions with no intervening eruptions. Basemap sources: ESRI, HERE, Garmin, Intermap, increment P Corp. Map of lava flows erupted from the Southwest Rift Zone of Mauna Loa, using data from the Geologic Map of the State of Hawaiʻi (Sherrod and others, 2021). Only one homestead (the Bertlemann’s) was destroyed during the 1916 eruption, which ended on May 31. The branched nature of the 1916 eruption-with the eruption supplying lava flows on either side of the rift zone-coupled with the relatively small total erupted volume ensured that the lava flows did not travel very far. Lava from the vents spread over the crest of the rift zone feeding lava flows on either side-the Honomalino flow moving down the steep southwest side and the larger Kahuku flow spreading more widely to the southeast. Later, another swarm of earthquakes shook Ka‘ū residents as lava intruded the SWRZ resulting in a line of fissures opening on the lower SWRZ on the evening of May 21. Activity in this high-elevation area, technically considered the summit region, lasted less than 24 hours. Residents of Ka‘ū felt numerous earthquakes early in the morning before an impressive steam plume, visible from Kīlauea’s summit, rose high up on Mauna Loa’s SWRZ at about 7:15 a.m., marking the start of the eruption. Like many eruptions on the Island of Hawai‘i, the May 19th, 1916, eruption was preceded by earthquake activity. While the long-term odds for flipping heads and tails are equal, it doesn’t mean you can’t flip four tails in a row. Jaggar had observed at Mauna Loa, suggesting that the eruption probability might be more like a “coin flip” model. The May 19, 1916, SWRZ outbreak deviated from the pattern of eruptions Dr.
Jaggar hypothesized that the next Mauna Loa flank eruption would occur from the NERZ, assuming the prior pattern meant there was an underlying reason for the alternation of rift eruption sites. Mauna Loa had erupted in 1907 from the SWRZ and in 1914–15 from the summit. The previous rift eruptions alternated locations between the Northeast Rift Zone (NERZ) and the SWRZ though these were frequently separated in time by eruptions confined to Mauna Loa’s summit caldera (Moku‘āweoweo). Thomas Jaggar, who had founded the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory a mere four years earlier in 1912, attempted to forecast the next Mauna Loa eruption based on the pattern of rift zone eruptions on the volcano since 1868. The eruption began on May 19th, 1916, and was brief, lasting less than two weeks, but it offers lessons for future Mauna Loa eruptions.ĭr. Wood and courtesy of University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Hamilton Library. View is from within Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park, with Kīlauea caldera wall visible in the middle of the photo. Image of the steam plume that accompanied the start of Mauna Loa’s 1916 eruption on the Southwest Rift Zone.
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