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  PUBLICATION_DATE    = 2009-11-15
  NOTE                = "Geologic setting description"
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The 1959 eruption of Kilauea Iki

The 1959 summit eruption of Kilauea Volcano, in Kilauea Iki Crater, lasted
over a month and produced some of the largest, highest fire-fountaining events
of the 20th century. The eruption produced a lava lake that at its peak was
nearly 45 million cubic meters and was 126 m deep. It is estimated that over
100 million cubic meters of material made it to the surface during this
eruption. Because a large fraction of erupted lava drained from the lava lake
back into the magma chamber, the net volume of lava remaining in the lava lake
once the eruption ceased was about 38 million cubic meters.

The Kilauea Iki eruption was predicated by swarms of deep earthquakes starting
three months prior, followed by inflation of the caldera. Another earthquake
swarm occurred two months before the eruption, and earthquakes increased
tenfold on November 14, 1959, 5 hours before the eruption. The eruption itself
emanated from a long set of fissures that at one point stretched 800 m; it
narrowed to one vent within about 24 hours.

The eruption was characterized by very high lava fountains, rising as much as
425 m at some periods, and producing cinders, spatter and pumice that were
deposited on the leeward side of Kilauea Iki. The lava lake itself is composed
of picritic basalt. Seventeen separate episodes were documented throughout the
entire eruption period. Eruption continued, with more or less vigor in each of
these episodes, until December 20.

The vent and conduit constituted an open system that was established early in
the eruption between the summit reservoir and the surface. Magma rose from the
reservoir or lava drained into it from the lava lake, depending on whether the
magma source reservoir was being resupplied or not. Lack of resupply in the
reservoir would drive denser, partly degassed lava from the lava lake down
into the conduit, while refill of the magma chamber would increase pressure
sufficiently to force lava back up the conduit. Eruption ceased when this
cycle stopped.


References

Easton, M. (1987), Stratigraphy of Kilauea volcano, in Volcanism in Hawaii,
ed. R.W. Decker et al., U.S. Geol. Surv. Prof. Pap., 1350, 243-260.

Eaton, J.P., Richter, D.H., and Krivoy, H.L. (1987), Cycling of magma between
the summit reservoir and Kilauea Iki lava lake during the 1959 eruption of
Kilauea Volcano, in Decker, R.W., Wright, T.L., Stauffer, P.W., (eds.),
Volcanism in Hawaii: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1350, v. 2, p.
1307-1335.

Helz, R.T., H. Kerschenbaum, and J.W. Marinenko (1989), Diapiric transfer of
melt in Kilauea Iki lava lake, Hawaii:  A quick, efficient process of igneous
differentiation, GSA Bull., 101, 578-594, doi: 
10.1130/0016-7606(1989)101<0578:DTOMIK>2.3.CO;2.

See also the U.S. Geological Survey website
http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/kilauea/history/1959Nov14/MagmaBudget.html