Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Monday:
83 Lihue, Kauai
83 Honolulu, Oahu
83 Molokai
88 Kahului, Maui
85 Kailua Kona
84 Hilo, Hawaii
Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountain tops on Maui and the Big Island…as of 810pm Monday evening:
Kailua Kona – 79
Hilo, Hawaii – 73
Haleakala Summit – 50 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea Summit – 43 (13,000+ feet on the Big Island)
Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,800 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. This web cam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon shining down during the night at times. Plus, during the nights you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise and sunset too… depending upon weather conditions.
Aloha Paragraphs
Oheo Gulch…east Maui near Hana
Our winds will be light from the south and southeast…
with muggy and voggy conditions continuing
Our weather will be generally quite dry, except for
localized afternoon showers over the interior
sections, and a few along the south and southeast
sides of the islands at times too…locally a bit
heavier over and around Kauai and Oahu
We may see heavier showers arriving later this
coming weekend…especially over Kauai and
Oahu
The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph), along with directions…as of Monday evening:
14 Port Allen, Kauai – SE
09 Waianae Valley, Oahu – N
18 Molokai – ESE
16 Lanai – NE
27 Kahoolawe – NE
17 Hana, Maui – SE
25 South Point, Big Island – NE
Here are the latest 24-hour precipitation totals (inches) for each of the islands…as of Monday evening (545pm totals):
0.51 Mana, Kauai
0.92 Palehua, Oahu
0.03 Molokai
0.44 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
0.03 Ulupalakua, Maui
0.51 Kainaliu, Big Island
We can use the following links to see what’s going on in our area of the north central Pacific Ocean. Here’s the latest NOAA satellite picture – the latest looping satellite image… and finally the latest looping radar image for the Hawaiian Islands.
~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~
Our winds are coming out of the south and southeast, while remaining generally light through this week…into early next week. Here’s the latest weather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean, along with a real-time wind profile of the central Pacific…focused on the Hawaiian Islands. ~~~ We see a low pressure system to our north, along with a late season cold front stalled not far to the northwest of Kauai. We have moderately strong high pressure systems to our northeast…with a ridge extending southwest over the Kauai and Oahu end of the chain. As a result of these weather features, our local winds will remain on the light side, from the southeast and even south over the western side of the island chain. The southeasterly breezes will bring voggy and humid weather our way, which will stick around through the remainder of this week at least.
Satellite imagery shows patchy low clouds over and around our island chain, along with clear areas too…especially over the eastern islands. Looking at this larger satellite image, we see these low clouds over the ocean, being drawn up over the islands in places. Meanwhile, we see active thunderstorms not far to the northwest of Kauai, associated with a trough of low pressure…and the stalled cold front up there too. Here’s a looping radar image, showing just a few generally light showers falling, most of which are falling over the ocean at the time of this writing, although with a few more moderately heavy showers near Kauai and Oahu.
This abnormal weather pattern will remain over us, with little change in sight…until later next week. The primary reason for this unusual pattern is the presence of the late season cold front to our northwest. This front won’t make it to our islands, although has pushed a high pressure ridge down over the the state now. This will keep our trade winds at bay, and keep our local wind flow from the south and southeast. These breezes will continue to usher in muggy and volcanically hazy skies over our state. We’ll find clear to partly cloudy mornings, giving way to mid-morning through early evening clouds developing over and around the interior sections. The air mass will remain quite dry and stable however, so that only spotty showers are expected in most of those upcountry areas. The exception will be the locally heavier showers that could fall over the western end of the state at times. If an upper level trough moves near the state later this weekend, we could see some heavier showers popping-up near Kauai and perhaps Oahu.
In a nutshell, the details being described above are far from normal, as more typically we would have moderately strong trade winds blowing statewide this time of year, with a few passing showers falling along our windward coasts and slopes. The models are keeping the trade winds away until the middle of next week! I’ll be back early Tuesday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a great Monday night wherever you’re spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.
Here on Maui, at the 3,100 foot elevation, at my upper Kula, Maui weather tower, the air temperature was 57 degrees at 555am on this Monday morning. Skies were partly cloudy, with light to moderately thick volcanic haze, and no wind. It was surprising, or should I say not surprising, to see a sugar cane fire in the central valley early this morning. This of course adds smoke to an already hazy environment that we have going on now. I consider this a social crime…as the volcanic haze already causes some of our local residents to have health issues, which the smoke makes even worse.
It’s now 1230pm Monday afternoon, under mostly cloudy skies, light winds, and an air temperature of 75 degrees. Glancing down into the central valley, I see moderately thick volcanic haze, although not thick enough yet to obscure the West Maui Mountains from my view. As was the case yesterday, and many days before that too, the clouds are gathering over and around the mountains here on Maui. They haven’t taken on that darker tone however, which of course brings showers…which has happened each afternoon for many, many days. The very interesting thing about all this, is that these weather conditions may hang on over us through the next week!
We’ve pushed into the early evening hours now at 530pm, under partly cloudy skies, light breezes, and an air temperature of 73.8 degrees. The voggy conditions continue to be moderately thick, at least that’s how it looks from up here in Kula. The clouds gathered forces during the day, although as of the moment, hadn’t dropped any moisture. I trust that I’ve emphasized the unusual nature of the current weather pattern, referring to it as abnormal. I mean for crying out loud, what we’re seeing now, and what we’ll see through much of the next week, would be more typical of the late fall, winter, or early spring seasons. The temperatures are warmer now of course, although to have the trade winds displaced for so long, and likely not to arrive through the next week, well…is what I would consider a rarity.
World-wide tropical cyclone activity:
Atlantic Ocean: The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1st through November 30th.
Here’s the 2013 hurricane season summary
Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean
Caribbean Sea:
Gulf of Mexico:
Here’s a satellite image of the Caribbean Sea…and the Gulf of Mexico.
Here’s the link to the National Hurricane Center (NHC)
Eastern Pacific: The Eastern Pacific hurricane season begins today, and runs through November 30th.
Here’s a wide satellite image that covers the entire area between Mexico, out through the central Pacific…to the International Dateline.
Central Pacific Ocean: The Central Pacific hurricane season runs from June 1st through November 30th. Here’s the 2013 hurricane season summary
Here’s a link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC)
North Pacific Ocean: There are no active tropical cyclones
South Pacific Ocean: There are no active tropical cyclones
North and South Indian Oceans: There are no active tropical cyclones
Here’s a link to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC)
Interesting: Strong winds keep Antarctica cold…while Australia bakes – Rising greenhouse gas levels are causing stronger winds over the Southern Ocean. It’s good news for Antarctica, writes Tim Radford, as the circumpolar winds are keeping its ice caps cold. But Australia is getting hotter and drier – and its problems will only increase.
The answer to one of the enduring puzzles of global warming – the apparently sluggish response of the Antarctic continent to rising greenhouse gas levels – may have been settled by Australian scientists.
And, in the course of doing so, they may also have solved another problem: the parching of Australia itself.
Nerilie Abram, of the Australian National University’s Research School of Earth Sciences, and colleagues outline their findings in Nature Climate Change.
They report that they looked at the pattern of climate in the southern hemisphere and have concluded that the Southern Ocean winds that normally deliver rain to South Australia are being pushed further south towards Antarctica.
Poles apart
Their research was focused on a meteorological phenomenon known – although probably only to climate scientists – as the Southern Annular Mode, which marks the pattern of climate variability south of the equator.
For the last 25 years of climate observation, it has been obvious that changes in the northern hemisphere have not been matched by changes in the south.
There are geophysical reasons for some of the difference. For example, most of the inhabited landmass of the planet is in the northern hemisphere; the North Pole is covered by an ocean, while the South Pole is in the centre of an enormous continental landmass piled high with ice and snow; and the seasons and wind patterns of the two hemispheres run counter to each other.
In short, the two hemispheres are very different.
Weather observations
In addition, weather observations in the northern hemisphere are much more detailed and have been conducted over a much longer period than in the southern hemisphere.
Conspicuously, the Arctic has been the fastest warming region of the planet, and for more than a decade there was argument about whether the Antarctic was warming at all.
Lead researcher Dr Abram and her fellow scientists took the measure of the Southern Annular Mode by looking at annual seasonal data since AD 1000 – recorded in Antarctic ice cores and South American tree rings. They then used the information to build up a picture of the past and the changing present.
“With greenhouse warming, Antarctica is actually stealing more of Australia’s rainfall”, she reported. “It’s not good news. As greenhouse gases continue to rise, we’ll get fewer storms chased up into Australia.
“As the westerly winds are getting tighter, they’re actually trapping more of the cold air over Antarctica. This is why the Antarctic has bucked the trend. Every other continent is warming, and the Arctic is warming fastest of anywhere on Earth.”
Indirect evidence
Direct climate observations in Antarctica date back only about 60 years. That is why climate scientists must work with indirect evidence from ice cores and tree rings.
But although change has been hard to measure on the continent itself, glaciers have been in retreat and ice shelves have collapsed on the Antarctic peninsula. Meanwhile the west Antarctic is beginning to lose ice at an accelerating rate. The winds of change are blowing in the south.
“The Southern Ocean winds are now stronger than at any other time in the last 1000 years”, Dr Abram said. “The strengthening of these winds has been particularly prominent over the past 70 years, and by combining our observations with climate models we can clearly link this to rising greenhouse gas levels.”
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