Page 116 of Eruption

They ran outside and looked toward the summit of Mauna Loa. Through the thick, dark smoke of an ash cloud, a fireball burst, setting the sky ablaze.

CHAPTER 85

Mac and Rebecca stood and watched the fire shoot into the sky.

The first lava appeared in crashing waves that seemed to flow in all directions—to the north and east, as Mac had expected, but to the south as well.

Mac had witnessed multiple volcanic eruptions, sometimes at very close range, all over the world. He had imagined this particular moment for this volcano, had obsessed about it, had told himself he was prepared.

He was not.

“The flow is bigger than we thought,” he said.

Mac realized Rebecca was gripping his hand tightly, almost as if to steady herself.

She said, “I need to get to work.”

Within moments Mac heard and felt a bomb blast behind him, the noise and force powerful enough to cause a concussion; it was as if Rebecca had detonated one of her explosives next to the cabin.

When he got to his feet, he saw the huge hole in the caldera known as Moku‘aweoweo.

He saw the vent and saw lava now shooting out of it, a tightgeyser flowing across the helipad the army had built and heading directly for the Summit Cabin.

The fire was coming for them now.

The summit continued to explode in streaks of orange and red and even black, not just into the sky but down the slopes of the volcano.

Even with all the eruptions he had seen, he had never seen lava like this.

As he ran into the cabin, he heard the chop of helicopter blades. But even if the army had sent a copter back for them, it was useless now because there was no place for it to land.

CHAPTER 86

Above Mauna Loa, Hawai‘i

Brett and the Cutlers were in a replacement Airbus 225 newly purchased by J. P. Brett, and they were preparing to give the world a front-row seat to the biggest volcanic eruption in history.

“Shit!” the pilot, Jake Rogers, yelled as the helicopter bucked and jerked and then dropped a few hundred feet in a couple of seconds.

Rogers had just banked the Airbus in a wide swing around the summit and was now bringing them back to Mauna Loa from the southwest.

“Wind shear?” Brett asked.

“I fucking wish,” Rogers said.

Leah Cutler looked out the window, wondering what the pilot was seeing. Her husband, acting as his own videographerfor this flight, kept his camera focused on the top of the mountain, waiting for the perfect moment to start filming.

“Is there a problem, Jake?” Leah Cutler said.

“The lava’s already spitting out of vents down there,” he said.“Hard,”he added.

The big helicopter bounced like a small boat in a rough sea.

To Brett, Rogers said, “You told me the lava would be on the other side!”

Before Brett could respond, the helicopter jerked again even more intensely than before, as if a ground quake had reached up and taken a swing at them.

Rogers fought the controls. “Shit, shit, shit!” he yelled.