A quiet Sunday drive to Pahoa, Hawaii on July 22, 2018. The road to Kalapana was just re-opened, but Leilani Estates was closed to permitted residents only. It's an eerie drive, much of the foliage is dying, the gas fumes are strong. Getting out of your car and hiking up a hill for a better look will get you arrested, if you don't faint from the fumes first. You can drive much closer to fissure #8 than I thought possible, on an old single lane road. Fissure 8 has been erupting non-stop for 2 1/2 months spewing 20X the volume of lava compared to the last big fissure eruption that buried Kalapana in 1990. I was parked, thinking about trying to launch my XSP closer to the action, when a Humvee drove by with guys in uniform, reminding me of the consequences... I read in the paper eight were arrested Sunday--with a drone confiscated, and hefty fines. I only flew my drone outside the 5 mile no-fly zone (footage at the end).
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