Air Temperatures – The following high temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Monday…along with the low temperatures Monday:
79 – 71 Lihue, Kauai
84 – 65 Honolulu, Oahu
83 – 61 Molokai
85 – 62 Kahului AP, Maui
78 – 66 Kona Int’l AP
73 – 65 Hilo AP, Hawaii
Here are the latest 24-hour precipitation totals (inches) for each of the islands as of Monday evening:
2.82 Mount Waialeale, Kauai
3.42 Poamoho RG 1, Oahu
0.08 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
2.85 West Wailuaiki, Maui
3.65 Hilo AP, Big Island
The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph) as of Monday evening:
15 Port Allen, Kauai
27 Kii, Oahu
30 Molokai
22 Lanai
33 Kahoolawe
24 Kahului AP, Maui
28 South Point, Big Island
Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live webcam on the summit of our tallest mountain Mauna Kea (nearly 13,800 feet high) on the Big Island of Hawaii. This webcam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands, and at night whenever there’s a big moon shining down. Also, at night you will be able to see the stars — and the sunrise and sunset too — depending upon weather conditions.
Aloha Paragraphs
There are thunderstorms well offshore to the west
There are more thunderstorms…closer to the south and southwest of the islands
Partly to mostly cloudy…thunderstorms are increasing in our vicinity
Showers locally…some are heavy with flooding – Looping radar image
~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~
Small Craft Advisory…Pailolo and Alenuihaha Channels, and Big Island windward, leeward water, and southeast waters
Winter Storm Watch…Big Island Summits
Flash Flood Watch…entire state
Flood Advisory…Kauai
The combination of an approaching upper level trough of low pressure, and a moist, unstable atmosphere over the state…will lead to an increasing chance for heavy showers and thunderstorms locally. This latest rainfall event will become more widespread tonight and Tuesday…as a surface low pressure system develops in our vicinity. The low will shift north of the islands by Thursday, and in turn showers will diminish, although a southerly kona wind flow will keep conditions rather humid and voggy for the rest of the week.
The current forecast calls for an increasing heavy downpours and thunderstorms over the state. Initially the threat will be rather localized, however a more widespread event will shift our way tonight through Tuesday night, as moisture and instability is at its maximum. This threat has lead to a Flash Flood Watch into Wednesday statewide. In addition, any deep convection near the Big Island could produce heavy snowfall above about 11,000 feet…so that a Winter Storm Watch remains in effect for the Big Island summits.
The atmosphere will stabilize Wednesday night…although deep moisture may remain in place over eastern parts of the island chain. We should see this unsettled pattern easing, although with some possible lingering convection near Maui and the Big Island. The surface low will shift north of the islands Thursday and Friday, leaving the islands in a moist southerly kona wind flow. This will keep us muggy, voggy, and wetter than normal. Another cold front approaches the islands during the upcoming weekend…with the increased chance of showers. However, this next front should be less dynamic, with more limited heavy shower activity expected.
Here’s a wind profile of the Pacific Ocean – Closer view of the islands / Here’s the vog forecast animation / Here’s the latest weather map
Marine environment details: The current west-northwest swell will lower early this week, with surf remaining below high surf advisory levels. A small reinforcement from the same direction is forecast to fill in Tuesday through Wednesday.
A moderate northeast swell will remain in place through Tuesday night before lowering. This swell will bring near advisory level surf to select windward shores.
Moderate to strong breezes out of the east-southeast will continue tonight, resulting in a small craft advisory for the Pailolo and Alenuihaha channels and the waters south of the Big Island. Some uncertainty remains in the forecast through mid-week, in regards to the local winds, as the models continue to show an area of low pressure near the state lifting northward. Moisture and instability associated with this feature, and an upper trough, will keep locally heavy showers and a chance of thunderstorms in the forecast.
Looking ahead, model guidance depicts a gale to storm force low developing a few hundred miles west-northwest Midway Island Wednesday through Thursday, then tracking across the International Date Line Thursday. A large west-northwest swell will be possible across the local waters this weekend…generating advisory level surf.
There are lots of heavy showers offshore…stretching over the islands locally
World-wide tropical cyclone activity
>>> Here’s the Monday Pacific Disaster Center’s (PDC) Weather Wall presentation…covering the western Pacific and the Indian Ocean
>>> Atlantic Ocean: The 2017 hurricane season begins June 1st
Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean
>>> Caribbean: The 2017 hurricane season begins June 1st
>>> Gulf of Mexico: The 2017 hurricane season begins June 1st
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 2017 hurricane season begins May 15th
Here’s the NOAA 2016 Hurricane Season Summary for the Eastern Pacific Basin
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 2017 hurricane season begins June 1st
Here’s the NOAA 2016 Hurricane Season Summary for the Central Pacific Basin
Here’s a link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC)
>>> Northwest Pacific Ocean: No active tropical cyclones
>>> North and South Indian Oceans / Arabian Sea: No active tropical cyclones
Here’s a link to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC)
Interesting: What’s The Leading Cause Of Wildfires In The U.S.? Humans – Wildfires can start when lightning strikes or when someone fails to put out a campfire. New research shows that people start a lot more fires than lightning does — so much so that people are drastically altering wildfire in America.
Fire ecologist Melissa Forder says about 60 percent of fires in national parks are caused by humans: “intentionally set fires, buildings burning and spreading into the forest, smoking, equipment malfunctions and campfires.”
But the average for all forests is even higher. The latest research shows that nationwide, humans cause more than 8 in 10 — 84 percent.
“We are playing a really substantial role in shifting fire around,” says fire ecologist Jennifer Balch at the University of Colorado. Balch looked at the big picture, going through records of 1.5 million wildfires over a 21-year period. She says people are starting fires where and when nature normally doesn’t — at times when forests are often too wet to burn easily or at places and times when lightning isn’t common.
As a result, Balch says, not only are people causing the vast majority of wildfires, they’re also extending the normal fire season around the country by three months.
“I think acknowledging that fact is really important,” she says, “particularly right now when we have evidence that climate is changing, and climate is warming, and that fires are increasing in size and the fire season is increasing.”
You can see evidence of that along Skyline Drive in Virginia. The view offers an Appalachian panorama — rolling mountains carpeted in deep oak and pine forests. But it’s not all green, as Forder points out from the side of the highway at Two-Mile Run Overlook at Shenandoah National Park. Right below stands a grove of blackened trees; a few patches of green needles on surviving pines are the only green.
“We can see where it started,” she says. “That’s Rocky Mount right there.” The mountain is the namesake for the Rocky Mount fire, which burned more than 10,000 acres last year.
The park’s fire manager, Jeff Koenig, ran the firefighting teams that spent almost two weeks stopping it.
“We were probably 10-plus days without rain” before the fire, he says, “so you know it was expected. It was that time of year when you can expect fire activity.”
It was April, and spring and fall are when forests in the east usually burn, explains Forder, who also is with the National Park Service. “To have a fire,” she says, “you need the fuel, which is available each spring and fall with the leaf litter, which is constantly here, and the ignition source, and then weather conditions that would allow the fire to burn.”
That ignition source at Rocky Mount is thought to have been people. There was no lightning at the time; lightning fires happen more during summer storms.
Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Balch says there is a solution: Ironically, it means starting more fires.
Prescribed fires are intentionally lit — they burn off leaf litter and underbrush that would otherwise fuel bigger wildfires. Controlled fires also help germinate the seeds of many tree species. But people don’t like them nearby; they’re smoky and sometime get loose. “Now the question is, can we live with the amount of prescribed fires that we need in ecosystems?” she says. “Can we live with the smoke that comes off those fires?”
The research, she says, suggests that the alternative is a year-round season of bigger, more damaging fires.
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