Heavy vog on Oahu

by billso on Saturday, 26 April 2008

The vog (haze or volcanic fog) has been very heavy here on Oahu for the last two days.

This morning’s Honolulu Advertiser has a good article about where the vog came from, and how the haze is affecting local residents.

I was on the North Shore yesterday, installing a VoIP phone system for a client. I took these pictures from their site, which has an excellent view of the North Shore and the Pacific Ocean. The horizon is almost completely obscured, which is very unusual.

I have larger versions of each image on my Flickr gallery.

This is what the view usually looks like. I took this picture on 24 August 2007.

Tagged as: environment, Hawaii, images, kilauea, north-shore, Oahu, vog, volcano

malu

How is it now bill?

Bill Sodeman

It's been fine for the last 4 weeks. We get vog from time to time, and the last brutal batch floated through during October 2009.

billso

Our most recent vog outbreak has left Honolulu at last.

billso

The vog is back. Cannot see the mountains from downtown Honolulu.

billso

The AP has a good follow-up article today about the vog's effect on Big Island agriculture.

One reason the vog is worse is that the new vent is farther inland than the older Puu Oo vent on the mountain's seaside slope. While gas from the Puu Oo vent often blows out to sea, the new plume is more likely to hit farms and communities in concentrated form.

There's a Google map linked to the article, too.

billso

According to this Wikipedia article, vog is fog with some soot, ash, sulfur dioxide and other materials. Bake in the sun and serve. :)

Jeremy

So vog is actually smoke? Crazy, I always thought it was just fog...

billso

The vog has blown away this morning. The Star-Bulletin has a brief article about the weather conditions.

billso

Two articles from the Honolulu Advertiser: the first is a front page story about how the vog is affected big island residents.

The second article is the usual list of safety tips: stay indoors, drink plenty of water, don't exercise outside. I haven't gone for a run since Thursday morning.

billso

You're so right - I've only seen smog like this in L.A. and Phoenix.

The vog is really getting to me. I'm lucky we have a very good air filter in our home.

Aimee Blom

My boyfriend and I are suffering from this Vog, I thought I left So. Cal. and its smog behind, I have to say that the vog effects me more then the smog.