GOODBY, FOR NOW

My first posting occurred on 29 April 2008.  On 30 April 2018 I wrote, what I thought, was my final article for this blog site.  To quote:

I can't believe I continued, daily, to publish for ten whole years.  From tomorrow, I become an almost free man.

But on 3 May 2018 Kilauea Volcano re-erupted, so I felt compelled to post:

PUNA AGAIN BECOMES THE MOST DANGEROUS SPOT ON EARTH

Events here in the past shaped my life.  For example:

While I was the reservoir engineer in the mid-1970's with UH-Hilo Professor Bill Chen on HGP-A, one of the only examples of anything renewable in Hawaii that actually worked the first time, my interest was more on the total product potential, as I helped get started the Community Geothermal Technology Program, also known as Noi'i O Puna (NOP), or the geothermal equivalent of the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority for OTEC on the other side of the island. 

Then:

It was on 3January1983 that Kilauea Volcano first erupted.  I just happened to be golfing at the Volcano Golf Course that day, when, on the tenth hole, we felt the ground shudder:

Soon thereafter, we saw fountains of lava a couple of hundred yards high only a few hundred yards from where we stood.  This was the beginning of the current Kilauea eruption, which has now continuously gone on for three decades PLUS FIVE YEARS AND FOUR MONTHS.

Having experienced, first-hand, all the above, it seemed responsible to continue reporting.  Through the month of May 22 fissures opened and 1700 residents were forced to relocate.  On May 17 an explosive eruption occurred at the origin of Kilauea, Halemaumau Crater, sending a plume of ash 30,000 feet into the air.  On May 22, splashes from fissure #22 lava cone engulfed our Hawaii Geothermal Project site adjacent to the geothermal plant of PGV.

By early August this latest eruption subsided.  Officially, this phase ended on September 4.  However, it took into December for the USGS to declare, with caution, the end of the Lower Puna Eruption.  To summarize:

• there were no deaths attributed to the eruption.
• 13.7 square miles of land were covered by lava flows.
• 875 acres of new land were created in the ocean
• more than 700 homes were destroyed
• the estimation is that more than $800 million would be the cost of recovery

As of today, dislocated residents were grumbling about when government would begin any needed recovery efforts.

Today, this posting, would be a tempting end to this blog site.  There have been more than 2 million page views from 221 countries.  To quote from MY FINAL BLOG of 30 April 2018:

However, over the next few months I will be focusing more on several books I have been considering:

• Certainly, I will complete PEARL'S ASHES, the e-book.
• I also haven't quite completed my ten most memorable postings.  Next, #6.
• If there is a natural disaster of significance, certainly I will cover that.

• Every so often I will feel compelled to fulminate, with humor, on something to do with President Trump.
• I will at least monthly summarize the status of the following subjects:
• renewable energy
• the Blue Revolution
• global warming
• religion
• nutrition
• life

• Certainly, there will be my kind of movie reviews.  Go to those Marvel movies, I won't.
• Also, too, I will embellish you with details on my epicurean tastes.

• If I travel, I will now and then provide some highlights...and, will I be on an around that fantasy world cruise in 2020?  Dubai is hosting the World Expo that year, and when they do something, they go bonkers.  I'll need to find a global ship that stops there.

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