The Last Volcano Read online

  The government had not provided warning nor could it have responded quickly enough to organize the evacuation. Instead, the exodus had been haphazard and, after the initial explosive eruptions on January 12, thousands of people were still on the island. More than a dozen died. After the disaster was over, the people of Sakurajima erected a memorial to those who had perished, one that is still known as “the distrust monument.” It is a warning to future generations and reads, in part: “It is essential that residents put no trust in theory, but make preparations to evacuate immediately after detecting abnormalities.”

  Clearly, major steps needed to be made toward the prediction of eruptions.

  Jaggar returned to Kilauea on April 21. Eleven days later, on May 2, for the first time in more than a year, molten lava returned to the bottom of Halema’uma’u. It was a pool about twenty-five feet across over the spot where Old Faithful had spouted. Over the next several months, the pool of lava grew slowly in size. Jaggar resumed his daily trips to the crater. Occasionally, he noticed a jet of gas throwing out bits of incandescent material in one corner of the crater floor.

  As this minor activity continued, Jaggar and Wood made modifications to the Bosch-Omori seismograph. They replaced the original silk threads that suspended the heavy weights with short strands of piano wire retrieved from Haworth’s kite experiments. They also invented a way to reduce the constant jitter of the long horizontal arms by adding small damping pots filled with cooking oil. The improvements soon paid off.

  Shortly after noon on November 25, Wood called Jaggar down to the vault. The stylus on the Bosch-Omori seismograph was vibrating back and forth, tracing out a series of small earthquakes. They watched as ten such shakings were recorded over the next hour. All were too small for them to feel. Jaggar noticed the tracings were different in form from any that he had been able to associate with locally felt earthquakes or with rockfalls at Halema’uma’u. Wood suggested that something was happening at Mauna Loa.

  The observatory was surrounded by fog all that afternoon, and so there was no view of Mauna Loa. Wood left the vault and the observatory at 6:15 that evening and was walking back to the Volcano House. The fog had started to lift. He stood and watched. After a few minutes, now with a clear view, he could see a single column of white fume rising from the summit of Mauna Loa twenty-five miles away. He waited. After several minutes, a second column rose. The two merged to form a broad anvil-shaped cloud, one that was clearly different from normal weather clouds. Now there was no doubt: Mauna Loa had started to erupt.

  This was a first in volcano studies. Never before had anyone detected a flurry of earthquakes immediately before an eruption based solely on the use of a seismograph. Yes, many eruptions around the world had been preceded by earthquakes that were strong enough to be felt, but there were also many eruptions that seemed to begin without any seismic forewarning, including the most recent eruption of Mauna Loa in 1907. And so this was a milestone. Jaggar and Wood had shown that seismographs could give reliable and useful recordings (something that was still questioned after the Sakurajima eruption). And Jaggar would demonstrate this again and again for eruptions at Mauna Loa and Kilauea.

  Today seismic recordings are at the heart of predicting eruptions. Time and again, a sudden flurry of earthquakes has proven to be the most reliable indicator of an imminent eruption.

  Throughout the evening of November 25, 1914, every guest and every worker at the Volcano House came outside to stand and look toward Mauna Loa where the sky was lit with a bright orange hue. People as far away as Honolulu would report seeing the glow.

  Jaggar and Lancaster, however, busied themselves that evening at the observatory, making preparations for a hasty trip to the summit of Mauna Loa. Jaggar enlisted the aid of a local man, nineteen-year-old John Gouvea, to assist them.

  Jaggar had been to the summit of Mauna Loa only once before, in September 1913. And everything had gone perfectly. He and Lancaster had made it to the summit of the 14,000-foot-high volcano in one day, using horses and following an ancient Hawaiian trail on the southeast side of the mountain. The weather had been clear and the wind was calm. He and Lancaster had spent four pleasant days at the summit. He expected it would be the same this time.

  On the afternoon of the second day of the eruption, after all preparations were completed, Gouvea, using one of the hotel’s automobiles, drove Jaggar and Lancaster to nearby ranches where Jaggar attempted to secure riding and pack animals, but none of the ranchers would rent animals at any price fearing they would be returned exhausted and with their legs cut by fresh lava. And so an entire day was lost. That night Gouvea drove Jaggar and Lancaster to the west side of the island where they found lodging at a boarding house.

  The next day was yet another day of frustration. Not until mid-afternoon was a rancher found who would provide animals, though the ones he did provide were of questionable health. In the end, Jaggar secured the use of three horses and five mules. He also convinced one of the ranch hands, Charlie Kaa, who was familiar with a trail that led to the summit of Mauna Loa from the west side, to guide them.

  It would be a thirty-mile trek, mostly over open land. Kaa, Lancaster and Gouvea rode horses. Jaggar chose one of the mules. Each man led a pack animal. They had gotten a late start, and so they had managed to travel only a few miles when darkness forced them to stop and camp for the night. The weather was clear. The night sky over Mauna Loa was lit brilliantly by the eruption.

  The four men were awake and were on their way before sunrise. They rode all day, without stopping for rest or to eat, Kaa repeatedly saying that they could reach the summit and see the lava fountains before sundown. The first half of the morning they traveled across grassland and through an occasional small tree grove. By late morning the trail was barren hard lava.

  All went well until about 4 P.M. when a storm of sleet and wind came up, slowing their progress. Two hours later, just as the sun was setting, Jaggar thought he had the eruption in sight, but neither man nor beast could withstand the bitter cold and strong wind anymore. Ice had formed on the long hair and on the lips of the animals. The men were suffering from the altitude and from hunger. And so, less than a mile from completing their journey, Jaggar decided they should turn back. They retraced their steps, traveling back about a mile to a lower elevation, finally stopping when the sleet changed to rain. Here they spent the second night camped on hard rock.

  Though everyone was exhausted, as Jaggar recounted it, Lancaster stirred himself to action and “was right on the job and self-sacrificing.” He set up the small teepee-style tent that would be their only shelter, a large oilskin sheet held up by a single upright pole. He carried stones and piled them around the outside of the tent to keep the edges from flapping in what was an increasingly strong wind. After the animals had been unloaded and fed and the men were inside the tent, Lancaster lighted a small kerosene stove and warmed a mixture of canned milk and coffee and gave a portion to each man. And it was Lancaster who, throughout the night, left the tent occasionally to check on the animals and made sure they did not stray too far.

  Jaggar, Lancaster and Kaa had each brought a change of clothes and they put on their dry ones as soon as the tent was ready. But young Gouvea had brought only the clothes he was wearing. He was shivering and cold and laid down in the center of the tent. Lancaster lay next to him, keeping the young man from freezing by using the warmth of his own body.

  The intensity of the storm rose and fell. During a long lull, the men thought it might be over, but then came a sudden howl of wind and the pelting of increased rain. When that happened, everyone became anxious, wondering if the tent might blow down or be torn to shreds, leaving them exposed. “If we had lost the tent,” Jaggar confided in his journal, “we could have been soaked over again and that might have been fatal.”

  Jaggar spent the night in a half-crouched, half-sitting position, buttressing his back against his small pack in an effort to keep his head higher than his legs, dealing, as
best as he could, with an uneven rocky surface under him. Between pelts of rain, he could hear the animals tramp around the tent. Every now and then, he heard a squeal when two of the animals had a tiff. During those rare moments when both the wind and the rain stopped, he could hear the faint rumbling of lava fountains about two miles away.

  The storm ended by daybreak. The sky was still overcast and the ground was covered with snow. The men could see clear weather far to the west. Jaggar looked over the men. Everyone was still tired and hungry. And so he decided to abandon camp and leave the equipment—Kaa would be sent to retrieve the tent and other items a week later—and return to the coast. They saddled the horses and mules—the seat and pommel of Jaggar’s saddle had been chewed away by one of the animals during the night, making his ride difficult—and left without seeing the eruption.

  It took two days to return to Kilauea. Jaggar was still suffering physically from the cold. A doctor was called. He prescribed rest and medication. Jaggar spent the next week in bed.

  The eruption of Mauna Loa continued. After a week of rest, Jaggar organized a second attempt to climb to the summit. This time he and Lancaster ascended from the southeast side of the mountain, using only mules as riding and pack animals. The climb took two days. By noon of the second day, they were plodding through snow. An hour later, they were standing at the top of Mauna Loa.

  Mauna Loa has a summit caldera much like the one at Kilauea, except more spectacular. The walls are higher and steeper and there are only two ways down to the floor.

  From their position, Jaggar and Lancaster could see a short line of lava fountains near the southern caldera wall. Occasionally, a jet of lava would shoot higher than the others. When that happened, Jaggar could follow individual fragments of molten red rock as they fell, passing through successive shades of red from cherry to claret and ending as black.

  The men found a way to the base of the fountains where they collected a few of the falling fragments. Unlike at Kilauea where much of the material tossed into the air remains whole when it hits the ground, here in the rarefied air of Mauna Loa the ejecta floats away slowly like crumpled sheets of burnt paper.

  After returning to Kilauea, Jaggar was obviously pleased with his success. Always thorough, after writing a brief account of what he had seen, he wrote a private note to himself. It was a reminder of how to be better prepared for the next eruption of Mauna Loa. The list included: never rush to the summit, always make sure everyone has a change of clothes and “use mules if possible.”

  The new year of 1915 began a few weeks later. It would be the first full year of war in Europe. And that brought an unexpected consequence to the Hawaiian Islands.

  The price of sugar doubled during the first six months of the First World War. It doubled again during the second six months. The result was to make the owners of sugar plantations, such as Lorrin Thurston, wealthy. For an obvious reason, the war also deterred people in the United States from traveling to Europe. Instead, those who had a desire to travel turned their attention to the Pacific, greatly boosting the number of tourists coming to the Hawaiian Islands.

  In February 1915 the SS Great Northern, built just the previous year, made its first voyage to the islands, sailing direct from Los Angeles to Hilo. Its sleek design and powerful engines cut the usual travel time from six down to an amazingly short four days. On that maiden voyage, the Great Northern carried 495 passengers. When it arrived in Hilo, almost everyone went to see the volcano.

  In May the Great Northern brought a full complement of passengers, which included a special group, to the islands: 124 Congressmen and Senators and their wives and other relatives and friends. The official purpose was to determine what new legislation was needed to govern the Territory of Hawaii. This time the Great Northern sailed direct to Honolulu where the group met Thurston, who would guide them around the islands. Their first night was at the Moana Hotel in Waikiki. That was followed by a few days of touring sugar plantations and pineapple packing plants. Then to the island of Kauai where Thurston showed them the need for new harbor facilities at the main port of Lihue. From there, the group went to Maui where there were more discussions about sugar production and where a large luau was held. Then Thurston took the group to the island of Hawaii where they spent their last afternoon in the islands at the edge of Halema’uma’u.

  Cooks from the Volcano House prepared a meal over volcanic heat. The guests sat at tables covered with white linen and they ate off chinaware and used silver utensils. As the luncheon progressed, both Thurston and Jaggar circulated among the diners, telling them of the need to make Kilauea—including the crater of Halema’uma’u—into a national park.

  House Congressional hearings into the matter were held in Washington, D.C., the next February. The Honorable Scott Ferris, a Democrat from Oklahoma, presided. Jaggar had been invited and would give most of the testimony.

  The former Harvard professor spoke for three hours, giving, as one newspaper reporter described it, “a stunning display of showmanship and scholarship.” Jaggar began by drawing a comparison between the wonders of Yellowstone and the lava lake at Kilauea. “It is a lake of fire hundreds of feet long, splashing on its banks with a noise like the waves of the sea, while great fountains boil through it fifty feet high, sending quantities of glowing spray over the shore of hissing gases and blue flames playing through crevices.”

  He continued. “It may seem to you that in this account I am too superlative, but those who have seen this liquid fire in the crater pronounce it the most marvelous thing that they have ever seen.” Jaggar then presented the committee with an enlarged photograph of the lake that showed streams of lava outlined by black rocky crags.

  Now Congressman Ferris chimed in. “I saw that. I was there. I stood right there!”

  Next, armed with more photographs and with charts and diagrams that showed the recent changes in the lake, Jaggar spoke of his years of living atop the world’s most active volcano. He told them of the recent eruption of Mauna Loa and how he had fought through a blizzard trying to reach the eruption site and how lava flows from future eruptions will threaten Hilo, the second largest port in the islands. He told them of his recent trip to Japan and the eruption of Sakurajima. And he reminded them of the tragedy of St. Pierre. Making Kilauea into a national park would not only preserve a national treasure, he told the committee, it would also be a boom to tourism and, hence, to the economy of the islands.

  Four days after Jaggar’s testimony, the House Committee issued a favorable report on a bill to make Kilauea a national park. Two months later, the bill passed both the House and the Senate. On August 1, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signaled his agreement by signing the bill, creating Hawaii National Park.*

  As a corollary to Kilauea becoming a national park, on February 3, 1916, the day that Jaggar testified in front of the Congressional committee, the lake level was 420 feet below the crater rim. Wood, who made the trip that day to inspect the crater, recorded that the lake was “vigorously boiling.” By early April, when the House and the Senate voted to establish the national park, the distance down to the lake was only 300 feet. On June 4, the lake level was 265 feet, the highest in four years, that is, since the establishment of the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. Jaggar was at the crater that evening and recorded that the lake showed “increased fountaining and rapid streaming.”

  The next day, June 5, Thurston, the old revolutionary, announced that he and George Lycurgus, who had been a royalist, had agreed on a selling price for the Volcano House and that Thurston would be taking control of the hotel later that day. At 8:40 that morning, according to Jaggar’s notes—he was standing on the crater rim at the time—the lava lake started to subside slowly. After two hours, it was down forty feet. The crater walls now started to fall inward, sometimes as great blocks, causing great clouds of cream-colored dust to rise from the crater. It was, according to Jaggar, “the most gorgeous display of volcanic clouds the write has ever seen.” By nightfall, the
crater floor had dropped an additional hundred feet. By the end of the next day, it was seven hundred feet, the lowest since 1894.

  Thurston withdrew his offer and never tried to buy the Volcano House again.

  As the floor of Halema’uma’u was dropping in June 1916, discussions were already underway, mostly in private, as to the future of the volcano observatory and whether Jaggar should continue as the director.

  In a letter to Thurston, MIT President Maclaurin expressed a concern about his institution’s continued involvement. In particular, Maclaurin wrote, “various rumors have reached here of [Jaggar’s] domestic infelicities and allied troubles.” In the end, Maclaurin informed Thurston that MIT would end its involvement at the end of its five-year commitment, that is, on June 30, 1917.

  There was also a growing discontent between Jaggar and his assistant, Harry Oscar Wood. As early as April 1915, Wood wrote to a friend, saying, “Things are not going well here, either for me personally or scientifically, or for the present or future of this Observatory.” He reported that he had “grown very tired and stale here” and that he felt covered with “a deep coat of rust, scientifically.” Furthermore, in his opinion, “personal troubles have hampered and threaten to destroy Jaggar’s usefulness, in his scientific capacity as well as in his promoter-administrative capacity here.”

  Arthur Day of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, who had collected gas samples with Shepherd and Lancaster at Kilauea in 1912, agreed with Wood. In a letter addressed to Wood he wrote: “It is in no sense surprising that you should have tired of the top of Kilauea as a continuous place of residence. The trouble, which is very real, is that few men can work continuously with either pleasure or profit in isolation.” It was for that reason that Day had refused regular employees of the Carnegie Institution from involving themselves in “continuous volcano observation.”