 It's one o'clock on Monday afternoon and you are watching think tech Hawaii research in Manoa and it's a little bit different today because rather than being the guest I am doing the guest hosting. My name is Pete McGinnis-Mark. I'm a research faculty member at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and at least for today I'm going to be hosting one of our new guest speakers and this is Estelle Bonnie who is a graduate student at the Hawaii Institute of Geophysics and Planetology and she's in the Geology and Geophysics Department as well. And we've got an exciting interview here today because we're going to be seeing some hot stuff. Estelle has been lucky enough to be traveling to the big island of Hawaii and her particular interest is studying lava lakes at Kilauea volcano. So Estelle welcome. It's a great pleasure to welcome you as my first guest and we're excited to hear a little bit about the research you have been doing. I understand that you have recently returned to Manoa after spending about two weeks at the volcano observatory on the big island. Is that correct? That's correct although it was one week, not two unfortunately. But I was there at the beginning of March working with Matt Patrick who is one of the scientists there at HBO who's doing a lot of research on Kilauea mostly and thermal remote sensing. So I worked with him on thermal remote sensing. What a great opportunity for a graduate student though to actually go and work with some professional volcanologists as well as to obviously be on the rim of Kilauea volcano for quite a long time. And I hope during this interview you'll tell us a little bit about your experiences there. But I understand that you are really working on the lava lake at Halimamo volcano. Is that correct? Yeah that's correct. So one of the projects I'm working on for my PhD is looking at Halimamo. So there's a lava lake that is at Kilauea summit. There's a lot of heat and people can see it as the glow at night, the spread glow. But you can also see it from space. So I'm using satellite images to look at that. Okay that sounds great. We've got a picture of Halimamo lava lake. Maybe if we can just see the first image up on the screen. And can you tell us what you're looking at here still? Sure. So this picture is actually taken from Halimamo crater. So it's you can see on the top right side of the image. It's actually HVO. That's where tourists can go and look at the lava lake. And HVO is the Hawaii Volcano Observatory? Yes, correct. Sorry. And so this picture is taken from an angle that tourists cannot see. And you can see the surface of the lava lake. You can see this black crust that's cold. And the incandescent cracks in between that's really hot. And that's what we detect from space. On this right side of the lava lake, if you go to the right, this really bright spot, I'm sorry on the left, to the right spot that's pattering. So there is bubble bursting. And in the background there, that low shallow slope, that's Mauna Loa Volcano. That's correct. That is correct. So that's the tallest active volcano on earth. It's rising at 4,000 meter high. That was the one which you opted back in March of 1984. Yes, that's correct. Now you actually spent a week out there. We've got a picture. The second picture will show you actually on the rim. And what kind of motivation did you have to go there? What can you learn by physically being on the rim of an active volcano? Can you tell us a bit about that? Sure. So actually that was the first time I've ever been on the lava lake, that close to the lava lake. So that was really exciting to me. And being there, you can feel the heat. You can smell the gas. And you can see and hear the activity of the lake. And it's pretty like, I cannot even find a good word for it. But being there, you can actually, it's more easily to understand what's going on and what you're studying. And this is the first time you've seen an active volcano. Or have you been to other volcanoes around the planet? And I was lucky enough to go to other places. I went to Mount Etna in Sicily for two weeks again. And I've seen one of the paroxysms there. And paroxysms for our viewers. What does that mean? Yeah, so they call paroxysm those strombolian eruptions, those short-term eruptions that produce those lava fountains, as well as the lava flow. Okay. And so the pyroclastic eruption is an explosive eruption. Is that correct? So that in Hawaii, it might be curtain the fire. People might have heard of that. Yes. Yes. Okay. So you're a physical volcanologist, meaning that you go out to these exotic parts of the planet and look at hot rock. What is it you're trying to learn? So there's a lot of things to learn. It's going to, but what I'm interested in is actually basically understand how this planet, our planet Earth is working. So by looking at from space or from the ground, you can measure temperature. You can measure speed. You can measure effusion rates of volume. And although this is really important for people monitoring the eruptions of the volcanoes to help hazards, understanding hazard better and protect people living down slope of the volcanoes. And of course, you and I both live here on Oahu. The amount of lava coming out also releases a large amount of gas. Is that correct? So we may be familiar with the term Vogue or volcanic haze, right? And those of us who have allergies, for example. So when you're studying Halimaumov volcano, can you tell us when we might have an allergic reaction a few days later? Or is that too far in the future? I guess no, that could be possible, but it's mostly taking into account the winds. So the prevailing, the trade winds in Hawaii are going south. And so it's going away from us instead of going towards us. So the Halimaumov is constantly emitting gas, but it's not always reaching us because we're north-west of the Big Island. But it has relevance for people living on other islands as well as the Big Island because of the gas presumably goes down, the trade winds might fail, and we see the volcanic gas on Oahu or on Kauai or something. Let's take a look at another picture if we may. And you can tell us this looks like an air photograph. Is that one that you took or is that? Yes, so I'm not sure that I took that one, but I was on the helicopter on that day. Must be exciting. It was definitely a memorable experience for me. So you get on this helicopter with the door open and you can just take videos and pictures the whole time. And I was with Matt Patrick and Tim Orr. Hopefully you were strapped in. I've flown on helicopters with no doors and it's quite an exciting thing when they bank around to the sides. Yeah, you're like taking a picture, but I don't want to go too far. Okay, and I think we have one other picture as well, which we can take a look at. Oh, and this is one at night. And are those things off to the left of the bright orange area? Are they your cameras or what kind of cameras? Those are not my cameras, but those are HBO cameras. They're the volcano observatories cameras. Okay. So those are thermal cameras. I'm not sure those are there all the time. I think those were not permanent. Okay, so those are the cameras that the survey has. If you go to their website, for example, you can see. I don't think not that one. Okay, so that's a different one. Yeah, actually, so they have one that they call the overlook, which is where tourists were able to go before the eruption started. Okay. And actually, on the first picture, you could see it on the left hand corner. Well, of course, this is a dynamic volcano, right? So looking at still photographs doesn't really give our viewers a good understanding what it's like. So I think you brought along a video, which we could perhaps take a look at now, to actually show what some of the dynamics are of the lava lake. Can we run the first video? Yes. Okay. And of course, there's some little bit of an introduction here. These are produced by the US Geological Surveys Hawaii Volcano Observatory. And there's the URL to the website. Yep. Everybody can go and see it. All right. Now, this is fabulous. Tell us what are we seeing here? All right. We're seeing the surface of the lava lake moving. So you can see it's mostly going from the middle away towards the sputtering area. And so this is the most of the time, the way it's going from actually north to south or left to the image from the right. That's the normal sputtering activity that's going on the Hellingman. Okay. And you said that it was spreading from the center outwards. What does that tell you? So there's basically movement. Is it a convection cell or something like that? Yes. And this lava lake, how big is it? So I just changed it in size over time. Okay. When the eruption started, I believe it was about 35 meter wide. And now it's up to 250 meter wide. And how far below the rim is it? So it's also, again, changing. And they have measurements of the lake level over time. And Okay, let's run that video again while you're talking. So we can see it's really, really spectacular. And I love the way that, you know, it's just like plate tectonics. Yes. Yes, actually, people use plate mnemonic words and have like ridges and subduction zones to explain the level. And of course, we can see all the gas coming off from the sides. That's the volcanic Vogue, which is coming out towards Oahu and that sort of thing. And when you say that you can see these kind of lava lakes from what kind of detail can you see in your space observations? So I used a certain satellite called MODIS, which is the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectral Regimeter that has a one. A mouthful. The pixel size of the image is one kilometer squared. So it's not like low enough to see the movement at the surface, but it's enough to detect the heat from the lava lake. Okay, that sounds fascinating. To be able to see this sort of thing with a satellite, and presumably you come back on a regular basis with a satellite to see how it's changed and you can get some understanding. Does this let you predict when the volcano is going to be really active or not? So we're still working on that. So we one of the measurements we do is the radiant heat flux. So how much heat is emitted by the lava lake? And we get so because we do this measurement in the midway of infrared over from my friend. Anyway, we have to take into account the fact that this during the day solar ray can affect our measurement. There's a lot of mathematics or engineering or a lot of detailed research that you have to do. Yes. Yes. Okay. So but I'm only using nighttime data to get to just not taking into account this solar effect on my measurements. But then you can see how it changed over time and try to relate that to the lake level. Does that relate or not? Yeah, well, I think we're going to be having to take a break soon. But when we come back, it'd be really interesting to know how you as a junior graduate student working on your PhD can actually translate the kinds of observations you're making here at Heli Mao Mao and sort of how that affects your career. So I suspect that we're going to be taking a break soon. So you are watching Think Tech Hawaii. And this is Research in Manoa. I'm Pete McGinnis-Mark. And I've got Estelle Iboni here, who's a graduate student working on Kilauea Volcano. Hi, I'm Nicole Alexander-Inos, and I was born three weeks ago. Congratulations on being there for me for some of the few weeks of my life. I'm starting a new show, The Millennial Mind, every Wednesday at 2pm for the month of April, where we'll go over some of the reasons why millennials are some of the most anxious and frustrated people at the moment. I'm Ethan Allen, host of likeable science here on Think Tech Hawaii. Every Friday afternoon at 2pm, you'll have a chance to come and listen and learn from scientists around the world, scientists who talk about their work in meaningful, easy to understand ways. And you'll come to appreciate science as a wonderful way of thinking, way of knowing about the world. You'll learn interesting facts, interesting ideas, you'll be stimulated to think more. Please come join us every Friday afternoon at 2pm here on Think Tech Hawaii for likeable science with me, your host Ethan Allen. And we're back. And you are watching Think Tech Hawaii Research in Manoa. I'm the guest host, Pete McGinnis-Mark. I'm a research faculty member at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. And with me today is Estelle Burney, who is a graduate student at the university. And she's been telling us all about the active lava lake at Halimaumau in Kilauea Volcano. Now Estelle, we mentioned before the break that you're a graduate student, you've been having this great time at Kilauea Volcano. And I'm interested as a graduate student, what's the point? People will see this show and they'll recognize it's a lot of fun, especially flying in helicopters, especially during nighttime observations. But what career-wise do you think is of benefit to you? Well, I guess the main point of going there and working in this type of environment for me is this is what I would want to do. This is definitely an environment that is really nice and challenging, but in a good way. So you want to do good research and monitor the volcano to help the research keep on moving and understand better how the volcano works and help people. So you want to be a volcanologist? Yes. That's right. So you spent like a week at Hawaii Volcano Observatory. What's it like for our viewers? Tell us, all the people there, are they geologists? Are they computer scientists? What kind of personnel are there? There's a lot of people working there. So I have to say that I also spent six months before I started my PhD working also at the Volcano Observatory. So I know them really well. And there's geologists, seismologists, gas geochemists, a lot of computer scientists, and even the tech people that help setting up all those equipment. That's very important. And they all work together hand in hand. Really, like, you can just go to the door and ask them a question about their specific subjects and help you out with your own research. So this is a great opportunity as a graduate student to be able to go and work with professionals. Is this the kind of place where you would like to work? Or obviously, people might be able to tell from your accent like mine, you did not grow up here on the Wahoo? No, I did not. So I'm from France. And unfortunately, as a French citizen, I'm not really able to work at one of those Volcano Observatory in the US. But we have others in other places in the world, especially one in La Réunion Island. It's in a French island in the middle of the Indian Ocean. And they have an active volcano there with the Volcano Observatory. That's just west of Madagascar, about 1000 kilometers or something like that. Yes, east of Madagascar. Very good. So you might actually become a professional volcanologist doing both fieldwork and satellite studies and that sort of thing. That would be the best thing that could happen to you. Well, let's take a look at some of the other images that you brought us. If we can go to the next slide, please. Oh, we've got another video. I'm sorry. So here we see a full description of the lava lake at the summit, the killer way of volcano, spatling at the lake margin. So here we go. And I guess what we're seeing here is the downward going part of this. Exactly. Right? Yeah. So the little, well, you can't see it as well as before, because it's not speed up this time. But as the gas is released in those bubble bursting is creating a downward movement. So the crust is and lava at this time is actually going down. Okay, maybe we can show that one again and take another look. And still, can you tell us what kind of scale are we looking at? Is it the same size as this table or this building? You know, it's really hard to get an appreciation for how big some of this. So I believe they use the crater wall as scale and the the highest. What do you see this red flubs pattern of molten lava is ejected. It can go as high 25 meter 25 meters, 80 feet. Yes, fairly high. Yeah. And so when we're seeing those fountains, those bursting bubbles, on Oahu, we're accustomed to lava flows like we see at Macapoo, or going at the Pali Highway, and they're just solid livers. What's causing the bubbles to be there? So that's just the gas is coming from down below. So it's right as it's rising up and actually exoles from the magma. Exiles meaning escapes from the magma. Yeah, and it creates this bubble and those bubble rising and then the crust is gets that it's not strong enough to keep it down and just burst and the pressure is too strong. Okay, okay. And what kind of gases are there? So you have a mix of different gases, CO2, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, some water, some chloride, fluoride, the bubbles are lesser amount. Okay. Okay. And where does this gas originate from? Is it sort of actually in the lava lake itself? Does it suck it out of the atmosphere or? No, it's in the lava lake itself. It's in the lava lake itself. It's related to magma chamber, further down. And the magma chamber itself is presumably kilometers or even 100 kilometers down. Yes, those are worked out by geophysicists. And they use also different like deformation to estimate the volume of the magma chamber and how deep it is. So when you say geophysicists, that would be someone who might be studying the small earthquakes associated with volcano and you can tell where what depth? Yes, as well as tilt. So how much the volcano moves. So as magma comes up, pressure increase, and it makes the volcano flank actually rise. So it's like an inflating balloon. Yes. That's something fascinating. And you can measure that inflation of the balloon quite easily or very precisely. Yeah, they use GPS. My GPS has used a lot leveling technique as well. And they get really good precision. Not 100% sure how much, but it's in centimeter movement. All right. But but also, isn't there another part of the Kilauea volcano that is active now? There's the Puta'ua event, which is further down the east. So are the two connected or they are? How are they connected? So we believe that there is, though there's a magma chamber, but as the magma comes up, and it goes to the summit, but also there's another conduit that goes down towards the East Restroom. Okay, great. Let's see another video. These are really neat. Thank you so much for bringing them along. And again, point out these are all produced by the US Geological Survey. This one is taken from the actual HVO building, not from the overlook. So that's what people could see. And this so this is a distant view, but oh, what's happening there? What's happening there? So a rock fall, some of the create some part of the crater wall fell into the lava lake, and it disturbed the lake surface and created this big explosion. Okay, so is this the way that the lava lake expands? Yeah. And presumably, that is why tourists can't go to the same places you went. Exactly. Simply because that might happen. Let's see that one again, because that was quite catastrophic and fun. All right. And this is sped up, of course. And so that brown cloud. Yeah. Is that the volcano exploding? Or what? What do we see? So I think there's a mix of the rock falling down. So there's a mix of old material that's from the crater wall, but as well as some of actual lava from the lake. I love the way that the surface of the lava lake was just down around and you had all of I'm presumably, that's because you had these rocks falling from the cliff behind it. Yes. And and either releasing gas or the big boulders just sinking through the lava. Yeah, because it's so the crust is usually colder. But as the rock fall, it's making the the hotter lava that's underneath, come back to surface. And and that's recelibrating over time. And does this happen often? Or are we just really lucky to have seen this one event? No, it's pretty often. It's pretty often once a day or no once a year or I would say maybe like once every couple months. We've got one more video. So let's just see if you can tell us. And this is another video of spattering of the lava lake. So this is just another great view. Obviously, you wouldn't be able to get as close to the lava way to see this. But I remember I worked out on the 2.0 lava lake back in the 1980s. And this is a very common. Yeah. So actually, some part of this, you cannot see because it's become another view and the creator role is hitting it. But I've seen something like that too. In my clava pond. So instead of being a continuous lava lake, you can form those kind of lava ponds that pull a flower and the same thing happens. Great. Well, so yeah, as we draw to close on the show, what's next for you? Getting your PhD, of course, which is the obvious thing that a graduate student has to plan for. Where does your research take you? What do you need to know? What do I need to know? Well, I need to know a lot more. There's still a lot more to know. But I mean, it's a tricky question. And for me, I will try to have a postdoc and eventually hopefully get to my objective to be working in an observatory someday. Okay, well, I think we're drawing to the end of the program. Let me just remind you, you're watching Think Tech Hawaii right here every Monday, 1pm Hawaii time. So we've been watching some spectacular videos. Our guest today, Estelle Bonnie has brought along Estelle. Thank you so much for being with us today. It's been a great pleasure. You are my first guest. I'm hoping that there will be many more from the university as some fascinating research which is being done there. So thank you once again for coming along. And thank you, the audience. I hope you found this very interesting and that you'll join us again next Monday for Think Tech Hawaii. See you then.