Chapter 9

Summit of Kīlauea, Hawai‘i

The red helicopter lifted off the HVO helipad and headed south. Directly in front of them, four miles away, they saw the black cone of Pu‘u‘ō‘ō, its thick fume cloud rising into the air.

He rechecked his equipment in his front seat, making sure he had everything. Jenny Kimura and Tim Kapaana were in the rear. Tim was the biggest of their field techs, a former semipro linebacker.

Over the headphones, Jenny said, "Mac? Hilo is saying they can get a Dolphin recovery helicopter over from Coast Guard Station Maui in thirty minutes, and it can perform the rescue. You don't have to do this."

MacGregor turned to Bill Kamoku, their pilot, a cautious, careful man. "Bill?"

The pilot shook his head. "It's an hour, minimum, for them to get here."

"By then it'll be almost dark," Mac said.

"Right."

"And they can't rescue in the damn dark."

"Hell, I don't think they can rescue in daylight, Mac," Bill said. "You get that big Dolphin thumping over the narrow crater, you're going to get landslides, and then it's game over."

Jenny said, "But, Mac—"

He turned to her. "Let's not kid ourselves. We wait, they die."

He stared out of the bubble. They were over the rift zone now, following a line of smoking cracks and small cinder cones in the lava fields. The collapsed crater of Pu‘u‘ō‘ō was a mile ahead and just beyond it was the eastern lake.

Bill said, "Where do you want to put down?"

"South side is best."

They couldn't land too near the crater rim because it was filled with cracks and completely unstable. Both Mac and Bill knew that.

"Why do you think Jake went down there?" Mac asked.

Bill turned, his eyes hidden behind the black helmet's faceplate. "Money. I think he needed money, Mac. And there's one other reason."

"What's that?"

"He's Jake."

The helicopter set down about twenty yards from the crater rim. Immediately, the helicopter's bubble clouded over with steam from nearby vents. MacGregor opened his door and felt air both wet and burning on his face.

"Can't stay here, Mac," Bill said. "I've got to move downslope."

"Go ahead," Mac said, then pulled off his headset and stepped down onto the gray-black lava without hesitation, ducking his head beneath the spinning rotor blades.

Jenny Kimura could hear the pinging and cracking of the lava as its surface solidified, the rumbling of new lava breaking freshly formed rock. She saw two glowing red vents on the outside of the crater wall, one to the west, one to the north. The downed helicopter was at the opposite side of them, on a shelf above the lake. But its position was even more precarious now. The lava could spin at any moment, meaning the craft was perhaps seconds away from sliding down into the lava.

Mac had already zipped up his green jumpsuit. He cinched the harness tighter around his waist and legs. He could loosen it when he got down there and put it around another person.

MacGregor handed the ends of the rope to Tim.

"Please let me do this," Tim said.

"No." MacGregor hung one gas mask around his neck, placed two others in his backpack. "You can hold me from up here. I can't hold you."

He adjusted the radio headset over his ears, pulled the microphone alongside his cheek. Jenny had put on her own headset and clipped the transmitter to her belt, and she heard MacGregor say, "Here we go."

Tim moved several paces back from the rim and braced himself. The rope immediately tightened in his hands as MacGregor went over the side.

Jenny was sick with anxiety, though she was trying not to show it. There had been two fatalities that she knew of inside Pu‘u‘ō‘ō crater. The first was in 2012, a daredevil American mountain climber who entered without authorization, was overcome by fumes, and tumbled into the lava lake. The second was in 2018, a stubborn German volcanologist who'd insisted on rappelling down to collect gas samples even as the crater was collapsing; he was caught in a gushing lava fountain—goodbye. Since then, no one else had been fool enough to enter the crater of the eastern lake.

Jenny adjusted her headset. Through the earphones, she heard the crackle of voices from Hilo control, then the sound of coughing coming from the helicopter below.

Jenny watched as Mac descended slowly and carefully into the crater.