Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, (sometimes informally called Hawaii Volcanoes Park, or even locally, just referred to as "Volcanoes"), is world-renowned both for its active volcanic activity in the mid-Pacific Ocean, and for its broad variation of eco-systems from mountain top to sea level, rainforest to desertified. This fantastic natural park has been designated as both an International Biosphere Reserve (1980) and is Hawaii's only World Heritage Site (1987).

There are currently 3 active craters (as of July, 2010), with Kilauea Crater near us and the main National Park entrance being the most active and most visited. The others are Mauna Loa, the giant mother of our island and a geologic wonder high above, and Puu O'O, a small "upstart" to the east of Kilauea. There are also rift zones (cracks in the earth) that radiate out from craters and erupt lava, fire, and ash about as often as the craters. With nearly continuous volcanic activity somewhere, the approximately 500-square-mile national park offers visitors a bird’s-eye-type look at one of earth’s great wonders ... for this is an island that grows before your very eyes, adding on average about one square mile of new land for every 20 years.

The most current volcanic activity update from the United States Geological Survey:
U.S.G.S. Kilauea and Big Island Volcanic Activity Updates

The Main page for the National Park's website:
H.V.N.P. | Hawaii Volcanoes National Park

So ... what type of volcanic system is responsible for building the entirety of the island's vivid landscapes? In Geology, there are two major categories of volcanoes, strato-volcanoes and shield volcanoes. Strato-volcanoes are the Mt. Vesuvius, Mt. Fuji, and Mt. St. Helens-type which catastrophically spew immense volumes of superheated ash, pumice and poisonous gases into the atmosphere during a typical eruption.

Shield volcanoes, which are the type in our park, can build mountains of great height, but do it more slowly and steadily, with lava flows predominating during activity. Shield volcanoes have catastrophic eruptions only very irregularly. Some visitors may think that "Hawaii Volcanoes Park" as a term should be including other, and older islands in our chain (most notably Haleakala Crater and the national park on Maui), but generally people are referring to our island because of the semi-continuous and historically most recent volcanic activity... more