The New International Encyclopædia/Kilauea

KILAUEA, kē′lä-o͞o-ā′ȧ. A noted crater in the eastern part of the island of Hawaii, 10 miles from the sea, and 30 miles southwest of the port of Hilo, on the eastern slope of the great volcano of Mauna Loa, 4000 feet above the sea, and 9800 feet below the summit of Mauna Loa (Map: Hawaii, F 4). It forms a great cavity on the side of the mountain, three miles long, two miles wide, and in the parts where the lava is not boiling from 500 to 800 feet deep. The floor of the crater, formed by the lava streams that constantly flow and cool in one or another part of it, accumulates slowly in periods of moderate activity, but is liable to fall in or sink at any time, especially during great volcanic activity, when the lava may escape from vents below. At the southwestern end of this great sink is a small lake called Halemaumau (House of Everlasting Fire), filled with boiling lava which flows through a subterranean channel under the rim of the active craters to the lower level of the main crater-basin, forming small or large streams upon its black surface, which cool quickly. The great eruptions from this crater were those of 1789, 1823, 1832, 1840, and 1868. There seems to be no subterranean connection between the sources of the eruptions from Mauna Loa and Kilauea, each having its periods of terrible activity without seeming to affect the other. Consult Dana, Characteristics of Volcanoes (New York, 1890).