Page 11 of Eruption

Jenny Kimura came in. “Who is that guy? Is somebody calling Hilo?”

MacGregor turned to her. “Are the reporters still here?”

“No, they left a few minutes ago.”

“Didn’t I make it clear the eruption hasn’t started yet?”

“I thought you made that abundantly clear, yes.”

“Mac, this guy’s a stringer,” Rick said. “He wasn’t at the press conference. He’s trying to get ahead in the world. You know what they say: Don’t worry about being right, just being first.”

“Hey, Mac? You’re not going to believe this.” Pia Wilson, at the main video panel, flicked on all the remote monitors to showthe eastern flank of Kilauea. “The pilot just flew into the eastern lake at the summit of Kilauea.”

“Hewhat?”

Pia shrugged. “See for yourself.”

MacGregor sat down in front of the monitors. Four miles away, the black cinder cone of Pu‘u‘o‘o—the Hawaiian name meant “Hill of the Digging Stick”—rose three hundred feet high on the east flank. That cone had been a center of volcanic activity since it erupted in 1983, spitting a fountain of lava two thousand feet into the air. The eruption continued all year, producing enormous quantities of lava that flowed for eight miles down to the ocean. Along the way, it had buried the entire town of Kalapana, destroyed two hundred houses, and filled in a large bay at Kaimui, where the lava poured steaming into the sea. The activity from Pu‘u‘o‘o went on for thirty-five years—one of the longest continuous volcanic eruptions in recorded history—ending only when the crater collapsed in 2018.

Tourist helicopters scoured the area looking for a new place to take pictures, and pilots discovered a lake that had opened to the east of the collapsed crater. Hot lava bubbled and slapped in incandescent waves against the sides of a smaller cone. Occasionally the lava would fountain fifty feet into the air above the glowing surface. But the crater containing the eastern lake was only about a hundred yards in diameter—much too narrow to descend into.

Helicopters never went inside it.

Until now.

“What the hell?” Jenny said.

Mac said, “Thatishell.”

CHAPTER 8

MacGregor kept staring at the image on the video screen. “Where’s this feed from?”

“Camera’s on the rim, pointing down.”

Mac could see the helicopter hovering right above the lava lake. The cameraman was clearly visible through an open door on the port side, camera on his shoulder. The idiot was leaning out, filming the lava.

It was like some daredevil movie scene, complete with special effects, Mac thought. Except what they were watching was real.

“They’re both crazy,” he said. “With all the thermals around there—”

“If that thing fountains, they’ll be friedpupus.”

“Get ’em the hell out of there,” MacGregor said. “Who’s on the radio?”

Across the room, Jenny put her hand over the phone and said, “Hilo is talking to them. They say they’re leaving now.”

“Yeah? Then why aren’t they moving?”

“They say they are, Mac. All I got.”

MacGregor said, “Do we know gas levels down in there?” Near the lava lake, there would be high concentrations of sulfurdioxide and carbon monoxide. MacGregor squinted at his monitor. “Can you see if the pilot’s got oxygen? ’Cause the cameraman sure doesn’t. Both these idiots could pass out if they stay there.”

“Or the engine could quit,” Kenny said. He shook his head. “Helicopter engines need air. And there’s not a lot of air down there.”

Jenny said, “They’re leaving now, Mac.”

As they watched, the helicopter began to rise. They saw the cameraman turn and raise an angry fist at Jake Rogers. Clearly he didn’t want to leave.