Devastation Trail

Devastation Trail crosses the surreal cinder field deposited during the 1959 Kilauea Iki eruption — a 36-day volcanic event that produced lava fountains reaching 1,900 feet, the highest ever recorded in Hawaii. The paved boardwalk traverses a ghostly landscape where bleached dead ohia tree trunks still stand rooted in deep black cinder, their bark and foliage incinerated within seconds of the eruption but their woody cores preserved in the oxygen-poor pyroclastic deposit. It is a haunting tableau: skeletal silver forms emerging from obsidian black. At the midpoint of the trail, a clearing opens to sweeping views of the 400-foot-deep lava lake that formed and subsequently drained in the Kilauea Iki pit crater. Ohia lehua trees (Metrosideros polymorpha) are slowly recolonizing the cinder flat — the same species that first colonized the original lava flows after the volcano built the island. Their red pompom blossoms appear in scattered clusters against the stark black ground. Native Hawaiian geologic and cultural interpretation panels explain the spiritual significance of Pele, the volcano deity, in Hawaiian tradition. The flat, paved surface makes this one of the few trails in the park accessible to wheelchairs and strollers. The trail connects to the Kilauea Iki Trail at its western terminus for those wanting to continue onto the crater floor.