On September 28 a minor overflow crept a few meters west of the rim and a few tens of meters to the east. A cone about 30 m high stood recently in the area now marked by the pit and its incandescent lava. Photo taken Oct. 2, 1997. The flows are encased within lava tubes for most of their length and are only visible through skylights in the roof of the tube. Skylight into lava tube.
Skylights are locations where weakened roof of the lava tube collapses, opening the tube to view.
Tube-bound lava is moving toward the camera at a rate of about 3 meters per second. It passes downtube 10 km along the flowfield, cooling only a few degrees in route to the shoreline. Photo taken Oct. 2, 1997. Both ocean entries have formed lava benches, where new land is building out beyond the former seacliffs. No one should venture onto the benches, no matter how stable the new land may appear.