canspice.org

For friends and family (and my benefit so I don’t have to go to the horrible Volcano Community Association website again), here are some useful links for keeping tabs on what’s happening with Kilauea, specifically surrounding its recent increase in SO₂ output.

The USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory maintains a close watch on Kilauea. Its daily update is a wealth of information. They have one webcam on Halema’uma’u and another on Pu’u O’o.

The National Park Service maintains real-time SO₂ monitoring. For reference, we live in the cluster of roads between the ‘Kilauea Visitor Center’ and the KVC’s SO₂ reading labels.

The National Weather Service provides both a five-day forecast and an hourly forecast table for our area. We live to the ENE of Halema’uma’u, so winds from the WSW are of particular concern. Calm or non-existent winds are also troublesome, as the SO₂ doesn’t clear out from our neighbourhood.

And finally, the County of Hawaii Civil Defense Agency issues statements, advisories, and warnings in its Civil Defense Message when conditions warrant. If they mention any subdivisions, watch for Mauna Loa Estates, the one we live in.

KTA, one of our local supermarkets, put out an advertising flyer for Earth Day. What eco-friendly foods did they highlight on their front page? Local produce? Organic milk? Seventh Generation soap?

Nope.

Frozen prawns. Bleached white rice. Bleached paper towels. Apples from the mainland. Canned fruit drinks. Tortilla chips. And Dutch beer.

Only one local product, and that’s flavoured sugar water shipped in aluminum cans that have a 60% chance of ending up being recycled in Hawaii. Zero organic products. The products that could be unbleached weren’t. And the majority of them have to be shipped from the mainland.

Way to completely miss the point of Earth Day, KTA.

A few weeks ago, the Halema’uma’u Crater started spewing out sulfur dioxide, eventually putting out gas at a rate ten times higher than normal. This caused the National Park Service to first close outlooks around Halema’uma’u, then to close the part of Chain Of Craters Road crossed by the gas plume.

Then, on March 19, the gas plume got stopped up, and the resulting pressure increase lead to an explosion, spreading rocks and debris across a 75-acre area.

Five days after that, the white gas plume changed to a gritty grey colour caused by ash and dust. Hawaii Volcano Observatory staff reported incandescence and found Pele’s hair, Pele’s tears, and spatter in the overlook area, which indicates that molten lava erupted from the vent.

This is the first time that lava has erupted at Halema’uma’u since 1982. It’s a small amount of lava, but it’s a good sign that activity is present at the summit of Kilauea instead of just near the Pu’u O’o caldera.

USGS press releases:
New gas vent in Halema‘uma‘u crater doubles sulfur dioxide emission rates
Explosive eruption in Halema`uma`u Crater, Kilauea Volcano, is first since 1924
Halema`uma`u gas plume becomes ash-laden

In the November 2-4 2007 edition of USA Weekend, Steve Dale answered some questions from pet owners. One of them was from a ferret owner who recently moved to California, only to find out that ferrets are banned there. Dale’s response was as follows:

I think it’s crazy, too. Some are worried that ferrets, over time, would get outdoors and form wild colonies, like cats who get outside sometimes do. Then, to survive, the former pet ferrets would become savage and indulge in meals of endangered waterfowl. However, domestic ferrets who get lost typically starve to death. And the overwhelming majority of pet ferrets are purchased spayed or neutered, so it’s impossible for any who might live long enough to be able to find a partner and procreate.

Hawaii and California are the only states that ban ferrets. Yet no state currently has a problem with marauding colonies of feral ferrets.

I think the law banning ferrets is ridiculous, and I once proposed a solution to guarantee that any ferrets who get out won’t cause a problem: Mandate spaying/neutering (as I said before, they are usually altered anyway), rabies vaccines and microchipping (so that animal control will know who the careless owners are who repeatedly misplace their pet ferrets).

This kind of advice might work on the mainland, but it doesn’t work in Hawaii. Let’s pick apart his argument:
Dale says “domestic ferrets who get lost typically starve to death.” This means that there are some domestic ferrets who don’t starve to death.

Dale says “the overwhelming majority of pet ferrets are purchased spayed or neutered.” This means that there are some pet ferrets that aren’t spayed or neutered.

Dale then says that because of these two things “it’s impossible for any who might live long enough to be able to find a partner and procreate.” This is completely wrong. You can’t get “impossible” from two very possible things.

Dale states that “Hawaii and California are the only states that ban ferrets.” True. What he doesn’t say is why they’ve banned ferrets. Hawaii has banned them because they may be carriers of the rabies virus. Hawaii is rabies-free and we’d like to keep it that way. Further, Hawaii’s ecosystem is fragile, and given ferrets’ carnivorous diet of small prey such as birds and mice, the accidental introduction of ferrets into that ecosystem could prove to be costly to the endangered bird populations here.

So Steve Dale, when you say that the ban on ferrets is “crazy”, I think you need to think about it a little bit first. Do a little research before you write. Your careless column may only serve to weaken the efforts put forth by our state to keep our islands rabies-free and to keep invasive species off our islands.

Someone call the whaaaaaaaaambulance, we’ve got a terminal case in John W. Snow, the chairman of Cerberus Capital Management, the company that’s buying Chrysler. According to him, a Senate bill that would raise the fuel economy standards to 35mpg for cars and light trucks by 2020 is

a set of standards that are so one-sided that they can’t be met and which have the risk of sinking the U.S. auto industry.

Oh do shut up, Mr. Snow. Your industry is slowly killing the environment, and you have the technology to easily meet these goals. Your bad business decisions are sinking the U.S. auto industry. Why is it that Japanese auto manufacturers aren’t crying about this bill? Why just the U.S. auto manufacturers who insist on building gas guzzling Hummers and Escalades instead of pushing hybrids and alternative-fuel vehicles? Maybe you might want to take some lessons from Toyota or Honda on how to run an auto manufacturing company instead of putting your head in the sand and saying “whaa the government is trying to kill us whaa”.

via the new york times