By Rod Thompson, Star-Bulletin
Sandra Snell-Dobert and her husband, Stephen Dobert,
recall their evacuation from remote Napau crater
on Kilauea's east rift zone.

The changes left scientists uncertain about what will happen next in the aftermath of yesterday's fire fountains, which returned to Napau for the first time in 14 years.

Two geologists camped at Napau during the night radioed that lava fountains 15 to 25 feet high were active from 8:50 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., observatory spokesman Will Tanigawa said this morning.

But with the shutoff after midnight came a leveling off of deflation of Kilauea's summit. That measurement indicates the amount of magma flowing underground from the summit to the Napau area.

When the present eruptive series began on Jan. 3, 1983, it started at Napau crater but within days moved several miles east, finally settling on a spot where it built a new 850-foot-high cinder cone called Puu Oo.

Yesterday, a couple camping at remote Napau said the eruption was apparently under way by 2:43 a.m., judging by a glow seen through fog.

Hawaiian Volcano Observatory scientists said fountain heights varied from five to 50 feet, coming from three fissures: one in Napau, one on its rim, and a third east of the crater.

Those eruptions shut off at 8:50 a.m., said volcanologist Christina Heliker. They resumed from 1 to 2:30 p.m., then again about 4:40 to 6:40 p.m.

Heliker said instruments show magma moving eight miles underground from Kilauea's summit to the Napau area. "Much, much more" magma was moving than was being erupted in the form of lava, and other readings showed the Napau area bulging with magma, she said.

One thing was clear. With no magma supporting it from below, a major part of Puu Oo collapsed, while the depth of the crater in its center doubled to 650 feet.

National park officials have closed most of the park's roads and trails, including Chain of Craters Road.

Her husband Stephen Dobert could hear it. "It keeps getting louder and louder and louder," he said. "My first thought is, they're not going to be using this as a campsite any more because it's going to be inundated."

The couple is used to low-level volcanism. Snell-Dobert, 37, is a naturalist at Yellowstone National Park, with its geysers and geothermal vents. Her husband, 47, is a maintenance man at the park.

But nothing at Yellowstone prepared them for waking up to a growing eruption almost in front of their tent at remote Napau crater on Kilauea's east rift.

They had heard booming sounds, like distant thunder, as early as Wednesday afternoon when they arrived at the campsite.

Dobert had guessed those to be the sounds of Puu Oo collapsing bit by bit into its own crater.

They felt a few earthquakes, which didn't worry them. "In Yellowstone we have a lot of quakes, so we're used to it," Dobert said.

His wife even woke at 2:43 a.m. to see an orange glow through the foggy night. She heard a "high pressure" sound, like steam vents back in Yellowstone.

But their campsite looked across Napau to Puu Oo, two miles away, and she thought the sounds and light were coming from there.

When the couple next woke, the fog was gone and the lava was visible through trees. Realizing they had to leave, though not wanting to, they packed their tent by moonlight and prepared for the 5-mile hike to Chain of Craters Road.

Before they could start out, they heard the sound of a helicopter, then saw its searchlight combing the ground as it moved toward them.

It was the Hawaii County rescue copter, called into action by national park rangers who knew the couple was in the area since they had registered before hiking to Napau on Wednesday.

As the chopper lifted them out, Dobert asked the pilot to turn the aircraft around for an aerial view.

"We saw a rift with a plume (of lava) coming out of it," Snell-Dobert said.

"It was a pretty long rift," her husband added. "I highly recommend it to anyone."

When the copter let them out at their car, they found it dusted with a fine coating of tiny cinders, four miles from the eruption.