A schematic cross-section through Kilauea and part of Mauna Loa, viewed towards the East. This shows how the seaward flank of Kilauea (and part of Mauna Loa) is pushed southward (to the right) by the intrusion of dikes down the rift zone (away from you into the plane of the diagram). This huge bulk of volcano is probably sliding on ocean sediments that accumulated on the ocean floor during the 90 million or so years between the time that our particular part of Pacific Plate formed and when the Big Island of Hawai'i started to grow.

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