The US Army once bombed a volcano to save a town. In 1935, lava from Mauna Loa crept toward Hilo's water supply, and Army biplanes dropped twenty 600-pound bombs on the flow. The eruption ended within a week, though geologists doubt the bombs did it. One squadron on the raid already had a patch of bombs falling on a volcano, approved four years earlier. Its B-52 crews still wear it.
