Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Friday…along with the minimum temperatures Friday:

79 – 68  Lihue, Kauai
83 – 69  Honolulu, Oahu
81 – 65  Molokai AP
85 – 67  Kahului, Maui
82 – 71  Kailua Kona
79 – 67  Hilo, Hawaii

Here are the latest 24-hour precipitation totals (inches) for each of the islands, as of Friday evening:

0.34  N Wailua ditch, Kauai
1.15  Kahana, Oahu
0.00  Puu Alii, Molokai
0.00  Lanai
0.00  Kahoolawe
0.01  Hana AP, Maui
0.03  Pahoa, Big Island


The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph)…as of Friday evening:


18  Port Allen, Kauai
17  Kahuku Trng, Oahu
20  Molokai
14  Lanai
29  Kahoolawe
18  Kapalua, Maui
21  Upolu AP, 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

 

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/west/cpac/ir4.jpg


http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/west/hi/ir4.jpg


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Our trade winds will remain active, although become lighter
into the weekend, the recent high and middle level clouds
will at least partially clear the state…with just a few
light showers at times

The computer models are suggesting much lighter winds
early next week…until the trade winds return, with their
usual windward showers around Wednesday onwards

High Surf Advisory…north and west shores of the main
Hawaiian Islands – except the Big Island


December Full Moon early Saturday morning / 227 am



 



~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~







The trade winds will remain active…although becoming lighter into the weekend. Here’s the latest weather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean, along with a real-time wind profiler of the central Pacific. We find rather weak high pressure systems in the areas east and northeast of our islands. Then there’s a more moderately strong high pressure system far to the northwest…which continues to move in our direction. At the same time, we have low pressure systems to the northeast, north and far northwest of the state. The trade winds will continue to pass over the islands…although continue to lose strength as we move through the weekend. These gradually lighter trade winds will then get much lighter right after the weekend for a couple of days. The trade winds return around the middle of next week for a time…becoming light to moderately strong.
 
The persistent high and middle level clouds are finally clearing from the west….with just a few showers falling locally.  Here’s the looping radar image showing just a few light showers falling, and most of them are falling over the ocean. The air coming in from the east now, on the trade wind flow, is drier than it has been…with fewer showers reported at the time of this writing. The windward sides will pick up a few showers, although we are moving into a relatively dry period. In sum: continued trade winds although somewhat lighter, gradually clearing skies, a few off and on passing windward showers. I’ll be back with updates on all of the above, I hope you have a great Friday night wherever you happen to be spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Friday Evening Film:  As usual, there are several films that look good and are drawing me into the theater, enough in fact that I was having a little hard time deciding which to see. I just talked to my neighbor Jeff, and another lady friend of ours, and we came up with one called Nightcrawler, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, Bill Paxton, Michael Papajohn and Riz Ahmed…among many others. The synopsis: Nightcrawlers is a pulse-pounding thriller set in the nocturnal underbelly of contemporary Los Angeles. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as Lou Bloom, a driven young man desperate for work who discovers the high-speed world of L.A. crime journalism. Finding a group of freelance camera crews who film crashes, fires, murder and other mayhem, Lou muscles into the cut-throat, dangerous realm of nightcrawling — where each police siren wail equals a possible windfall and victims are converted into dollars and  cents. Aided by Rene Russo as Nina, a veteran of the blood-sport that is local TV news, Lou thrives. In the breakneck, ceaseless search for footage, he becomes the star of his own story.

 The critics are giving this film a top notch 95% rating, while the viewers are coming in a little lower at 87%. I’ll give you our opinion Saturday morning, and until then…here’s the trailer. This trailer is not a light weight piece of work, so please use discretion when using…or perhaps don’t even watch. It’s full of crime scenes and car crashes…painting a pretty grim picture of modern society. As one critic put it: “Glides out of the darkness and seizes you by the throat.”


World-wide tropical cyclone activity:



>>> Atlantic Ocean: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2014 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2015. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued as conditions warrant.



Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean 

>>> Caribbean Sea: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2014 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2015. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued as conditions warrant.



>>> Gulf of Mexico:  The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2014 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2015. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued as conditions warrant.





Here’s a satellite image of the Caribbean Sea…and the Gulf of Mexico. 



>>> Eastern Pacific: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2014 North Pacific hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on May 15, 2015. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued as conditions warrant.



Here’s a wide satellite image that covers the entire area between Mexico, out through the central Pacific…to the International Dateline.



Here’s the link to the National Hurricane Center (NHC) 



>>> Central Pacific:  The central north Pacific hurricane season has officially ended. Routine issuance of the tropical weather outlook will resume on June 1, 2015. During the off-season, special tropical weather outlooks will be issued as conditions warrant.





Here’s a link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC)



>>> Northwest Pacific Ocean:  Typhoon 22W (Hagupit) remains active, soon moving through the Philippine Islands. Here’s a JTWC graphical track map…along with a NOAA satellite image. 



  >>> 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: Arabian Sea Humpback Whales Isolated for 70,000 Years – Scientists from WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society), the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH), the Environment Society of Oman, and other organizations have made a fascinating discovery in the northern Indian Ocean: humpback whales inhabiting the Arabian Sea are the most genetically distinct humpback whales in the world and may be the most isolated whale population on earth. The results suggest they have remained separate from other humpback whale populations for perhaps 70,000 years, extremely unusual in a species famed for long distance migrations.





 Known for its haunting songs and acrobatics, the humpback whale holds the record for the world’s longest mammal migration; individuals have been tracked over a distance of more than 9,000 kilometers between polar feeding areas and tropical breeding areas.



“The epic seasonal migrations of humpbacks elsewhere are well known, so this small, non-migratory population presents a wonderful and intriguing enigma,” said WCS researcher and study co-author Tim Collins. “They also beg many questions: how and why did the population originate, how does it persist, and how do their behaviors differ from other humpback whales?”



Previous studies on humpback whales, including several published by WCS, have revealed a great deal of population structure among humpback whales of the Northern Hemisphere and many areas of the Southern Hemisphere, particularly on breeding grounds. At the ocean basin scale, scientists are gaining an understanding of humpback whale gene flow, including in the Southern Indian Ocean. The dynamics and movements of animals in the Arabian Sea, however, are poorly understood.



“We have invested lots of energy working to clarify the population structure of several large whale species around the world,” said Dr. Howard Rosenbaum, Director of WCS’s Ocean Giants Program and senior author on the study. “The levels of genetic differences for Arabian Sea humpback whales are particularly striking; they are the world’s most distinct population of humpback whales and might even shed some light on the environmental factors that shape cetacean populations.”