Hawai'i, far from paradise today

In addition to the obvious effects of flowing lava -- watch your step! -- volcanoes have other serious effects on the environment, causing a great deal of air pollution.

For much of the year, the Kilauea volcano on the Big Island of Hawai'i has been pumping tons upon tons of "vog" -- short for "volcanic" and "smog" -- into the atmosphere, and civic leaders in the 50th state are having to deal with this very serious problem.  Like the pollution we're familiar with, it's chock full of noxious gasses and otherwise unhealthy ingredients.  As we know here in the Triangle, if that stuff doesn't blow away, fall down, or mix out, it can cause serious problems, especially for folks with respiratory problems.

A couple of things I take away from this:

• Humans aren't the only ones polluting the planet.  To be sure, we do plenty, but it's not just us.
• Evan paradise has bad weather days.
• Polluted or not, this picture is still pretty cool.

So, if you've got a late-season Hawai'ian vacation planned, keep that in mind.  Otherwise, the forecast looks good -- Honolulu should have plenty of sunshine and highs in the 80s through the weekend.  (You can check the forecast for anywhere in the US -- including Hawai'i -- from right here at WRAL.com!  Just click on weather above and type in the name of the city just above the 7-day forecast.)