Hawaii braces for more lava, quakes from Kilauea volcano

PAHOA, Hawaii (AP):

Sputtering lava, strong earthquakes and toxic gas jolted the southern part of the Big Island of Hawaii as magma shifted underneath a restless Kilauea volcano.

The trifecta of natural threats caused stressed-out residents to evacuate and prompted the closure of parks and college campuses last Friday.

Multiple new vents, from which lava is spurting out of the ground, formed in the same residential neighbourhood where molten rock first emerged last Thursday.

At midday yesterday, a magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck - the biggest of hundreds of quakes last week and the largest to strike the state in 43 years. Residents were also warned to watch out for dangerous levels of sulphuric gas.

Hawaiian Volcano Observatory spokeswoman Janet Babb said the earthquakes reflected the volcano adjusting to the shifting magma.

"The magma moving down the rift zones, it causes stress on the south flank of the volcano," Babb said. "We're just getting a series of earthquakes."

She said scientists were studying whether the quakes would affect the eruption.

The lava lake at Kilauea's summit crater dropped significantly, suggesting that the magma was moving eastward towards Puna, a mostly rural district of forests, papaya farms, and lava fields left by past eruptions.

Officials ordered more than 1,700 people out of Big Island communities near the lava, warning of the dangers of spattering hot rock and high levels of sulphuric gas that could threaten the elderly and people with breathing problems. Two homes have burnt.

Two new volcanic vents, from which lava is spurting, developed last Friday, bringing the number formed to five.

Kilauea has been continuously erupting since 1983 and is one of five volcanoes that make up the Big Island.

In 2014, lava burnt a house and destroyed a cemetery near the town of Pahoa.