A soldier who climbed over a safety railing to get a better view inside Hawaii's Kilauea volcano was injured Wednesday after he fell 70 feet into the caldera of the crater, Hawaii News Now reported.
According to a spokesman from Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, the 32-year-old man scaled a metal guard rail at the Steaming Bluff overlook and the ground collapsed beneath him, National Public Radio reported.
The man climbed over a metal guard rail to get a better vantage point. Then the ground beneath him collapsed. https://t.co/bK1HIwqsrn
— NPR (@NPR) May 3, 2019
Army officials said the man is a Schofield Barracks soldier who was training at Pohakuloa on Hawaii's Big Island, Hawaii News Now reported.
Rescue workers were able to airlift the man out of the crater with the help of a military helicopter, NPR reported.
The man was taken to an area hospital, where he was originally listed in critical condition. He was upgraded to stable condition, according to NPR.
United States Geological Survey officials said Kilauea is not currently active, according to its weekly report from the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory. "Visitors should never cross safety barriers, especially around dangerous and destabilized cliff edges," John Broward, chief ranger at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, said in a statement, according to the New York Times.
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