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

82 – 75  Lihue, Kauai
88 – 73  Honolulu, Oahu
86 – 73  Molokai
86 – 69  Kahului AP, Maui
85 – 74  Kailua Kona
84 – 65  Hilo AP, Hawaii

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

2.45  Mount Waialeale, Kauai
0.28  Manoa Lyon Arboretum, Oahu
 0.14  Molokai
0.00  Lanai
 0.00  Kahoolawe
0.20  Hana AP, Maui
0.06  Kawainui Stream, Big Island

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

16  Port Allen, Kauai
23  Kuaokala, Oahu
21  Molokai
22  Lanai
25  Kahoolawe
23  Maalaea Bay, Maui
25  Kealakomo, 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

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An out of season cold front…moving into the state now

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Several thunderstorms far offshore to the southwest

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A way out of season cold front reaching Kauai and Oahu…then Maui County


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Showers locally – Looping radar image

 

~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~

 

Broad Brush Overview: Rainfall will continue on Kauai tonight, gradually moving over Oahu, as an old frontal boundary slips into the Hawaiian Islands. An increase in showers is expected over windward areas of Maui County Saturday morning. Showers associated with the boundary will remain off and on active into Sunday, mainly effecting windward and mountain areas, although some will reach leeward locations of the smaller islands. Light to moderate trade winds will persist through the weekend…into the new week ahead. Somewhat wet trade wind weather is expected next week, with pockets of moisture moving along with the trade wind flow at times.

Details: High pressure sitting north of Hawaii is providing light to moderate trade winds over the islands. An old frontal boundary stretched east to west over Kauai, will continue to bring clouds and showers over the Garden Isle, and then move over Oahu tonight as well. The boundary will continue to sag south through the weekend, bringing windward showers to the smaller islands. However, some clouds and showers will drift over leeward locations. This out of season frontal boundary may disrupt the trades enough to bring leeward sea breezes Saturday, before moderate trade winds return Sunday. Windward rainfall totals will fall in the moderate range through the weekend.

Looking Further Ahead: The boundary will push west of the islands Monday, although the models are suggesting a wet trade wind pattern…even into next week. A  trough aloft, a typical summertime feature here in the central Pacific Ocean, is expected to set up near and just north of the state of Hawaii. This feature may raise the inversion, providing a slight enhancement to moisture in the moderate trade wind flow. As a result, there will be greater chances for showers, especially over windward areas, although not exclusively.

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: An old frontal boundary over Kauai will continue to sag south through the weekend, increasing showers for the smaller islands and adjacent waters. High pressure north of the state will shift east through the period, continuing to produce light to moderate trade winds. Winds through the typically windier areas around the Big Island and Maui County may reach the Small Craft Advisory levels later Sunday through next Wednesday at least.

The current small north swell will continue to produce very small surf in the typically flat surf (this time of year) along the exposed north facing shores. Otherwise, no significant swells are expected.

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Another large…just past full moon night

 

>>> Southern California Weather Brief: A low pressure system will bring breezy winds and below normal temperatures during the weekend. The overnight marine layer will continue at the beaches and coastal valleys, with drizzle expected Saturday night into Sunday. Then a high pressure system should build in by Tuesday, for well above normal temperatures with the peak heat at the end of the week. The skies will be fair next week…except for an overnight marine layer along the coasts locally.

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Clouds mostly offshore…a few forming over inland areas


World-wide tropical cyclone activity


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>>> Atlantic Ocean: No active tropical cyclones

>>> Caribbean: No active tropical cyclones

>>> Gulf of Mexico: No active tropical cyclones

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: No active tropical cyclones

A broad area of low pressure located a couple hundred miles south-southeast of the Gulf of Tehuantepec, is currently producing only limited shower and thunderstorm activity. However, some gradual development of this system is possible during the next several days…while it moves slowly west-northwestward to northwestward along or near the coast of Mexico.

* Formation chance through 48 hours…low…10 percent
* Formation chance through 5 days…low…30 percent

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: No active tropical cyclones

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

>>> South 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: Lost ecosystem found buried in mud of southern California coastal waters – Paleontologists investigating the sea bed off the coast of southern California have discovered a lost ecosystem that for thousands of years had nurtured communities of scallops and shelled marine organisms called brachiopods.

These brachiopods and scallops had thrived along a section of coast stretching approximately 250 miles from San Diego to Santa Barbara for at least 4,000 years. But they had died off by the early 20th century, replaced by the mud-dwelling burrowing clams that inhabit this seabed today. Paleontologists Adam Tomašových of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and Susan Kidwell of the University of Chicago examine the lost ecosystem in a study published online June 7 in the Royal Society Proceedings B.

Evidence indicates that the brachiopod and scallop die-off occurred in less than a century. Because this community disappeared before biologists started sampling the seafloor, its existence was unknown and unsuspected. Only dead shells remain, permitting analysis by paleontologists.

“This loss unfolded during the 19th century, thus well before urbanization and climate warming,” said Kidwell, the William Rainey Harper Professor in Geophysical Sciences. “The disappearance of these abundant filter-feeding animals coincided with the rise of life stock and cultivation in coastal lands, which increased silt deposition on the continental shelf, far beyond the lake and nearshore settings where we would expect this stress to have an impact.”

Continental shelves, the submerged shoulders of the continents, are a worldwide phenomenon. They form a distinct environment separated by a steep slope from the much deeper and vaster expanse of ocean floor beyond, and provide key habitats for biodiversity and fisheries.

Seabed studies

The seabed off southern California is one of the most thoroughly studied in the world, but in applying geologic methods to modern biological samples of the sea floor, Kidwell and Tomašových encountered unsuspected results. Today that seabed consists of soft sediments, where creatures such as segmented worms, crustaceans, molluscs, crabs and urchins feed on organic matter.

This is a fundamentally different ecosystem than the one that preceded it not so long ago, said Tomašových, who heads the Department of Paleoecology and Organizmal Evolution at the Slovak Academy.

“The methods applied here provide crucial information on ecosystem response to natural and human pressures over otherwise inaccessible timescales,” he said.

In pioneering these methods since the 2000s, Kidwell and her associates have fostered the field of conservation paleobiology. Their work has shown that misfits between live populations and the shells they leave behind on modern sea floors do not signal poor preservation. The differences instead indicate a recent ecological shift—one usually driven by human activities such as pollution or sea-floor dredging.

Tomašových and Kidwell based their new study on the analysis of samples and data collected from multiple sources. They have conducted their own research on the sea floor off southern California, but they’ve also benefited from samples and monitoring data that other scientists have collected from the area since 1954.

Brachiopods and scallops, which prefer cold waters and a gravelly environment, range from the U.S.-Mexico border to the Gulf of Alaska. Tomašových and Kidwell eliminated climate warming as a likely culprit in their ecosystem collapse, given that large populations of brachiopods persist near Catalina Island, where water temperatures are similar to those of southern California’s mainland coastal waters.

The paleontologists instead pointed to the dramatic changes that southern California’s watersheds have undergone since 1769, after Spanish missionaries introduced cattle, horses and sheep to the area.

Unmanaged grazing

The researchers established the age of the brachiopods using a molecular dating technique called amino acid racemization. All of the 190 shells analyzed were more than 100 years old, and most were older than 200 years, indicating that the start of the population die-off coincided with the rise of livestock and cultivation on the nearby mainland.

Brachiopods and scallops have low tolerance for high levels of suspended sediment, leaving them vulnerable to the side effects of a regional economy that focused on cattle production from 1769 to the 1860s. During this time, much of modern-day Los Angeles and Orange counties were subject to unmanaged, open-range grazing. The economy shifted to agriculture in the late 19th century, but in the absence of soil conservation methods, the side effects on the coastal ocean would have continued unabated into the early 20th century.

The researchers concluded that siltation associated with this prolonged period of unmanaged land use probably drove the collapse of the brachiopod-scallop populations.

“Extirpation was complete by the start of 21st-century urbanization, warming, bottom fishing and scientific surveys,” Tomašových and Kidwell reported, emphasizing the value of combining many lines of historical evidence, especially the application of paleobiological methods to present-day ecosystems, to gain a fuller picture of recent biotic changes.

They further concluded that siltation derived from coastal land-use practices is an under-recognized ecological factor on continental shelves around the globe.