The giant plumes of smoke erupting from Kilauea on the Big Island (Hawaii) marks where the red hot lava splashes out of a vent roughly twelve kilometers long and into the Pacific Ocean. From a distance the billowing clouds belie the violent activity underneath the water's surface where Kilauea has gushed out 2.7 cubic kilometers of lava since 1983. The lava's intense heat can be felt from over a mile away.
