See a live erupting volcano

“I'm standing 20 meters from the end where my father is waiting for me. I can see that he's nervous. In that moment, I hear the explosion that always comes right before the next eruption – one second later a lava fountain shoots up in my peripheral vision and I feel the heat. Shortly afterwards the shockwave comes, but this time I am prepared for it. [...] It feels like they could hit me at any moment, though no boulder lands closer than 50m away from the line. With every roar of the volcano my pulse stops for a short time, only to beat faster afterwards.”

“When we reached the rim, the world opened up. What we saw felt unreal. Lava was erupting energetically out toward the sky and flowing down into a glowing river. In the center of the crater, the lava river looked like a city of fire from afar. The eruption was so bright it was impossible to capture with a camera due to the high contrast against the 9:00 PM sky. We set up our chairs and just watched in awe. I felt this irresistibly strong energy speaking to me. It was like this grand, bright power drawing you in, telling you that nothing in the world matters other than this experience right now.”

“We just got back from the Big Island about two weeks ago and somehow managed to be there during Kīlauea Episode 42. Seeing an eruption in person was honestly one of the most surreal things I’ve ever experienced. At night the whole crater was glowing and you could see lava fountains rising up from the vent. My kids (8 and 3) were completely mesmerized and talked about it the whole trip. Before going, I always assumed seeing an erupting volcano was mostly luck or something dangerous that required a helicopter tour or crazy hike. What surprised me is that Kīlauea has actually been erupting in fairly regular episodes lately, and if you follow the updates and keep your schedule flexible it’s possible to increase your chances quite a bit.”