Hawaiian Islands weather details & Aloha paragraphs

Blue Angels in the mountains of Hawaii
Photo Credit: flickr.com

The trade winds will dominate our Hawaiian Islands weather picture well into the future. Wind speeds will remain in the light to moderately strong range, although those usual windiest areas will find somewhat stronger gusts at times. High pressure will remain anchored in the area north through northeast of Hawaii, which will be the source of our long lasting trade wind weather pattern.

Dry weather will prevail, with just a few showers falling here and there. Whatever few showers that do ride in on the trades, will fall along the windward coasts and slopes. The leeward sides will find dry weather, with the only exception being Kona slopes, where the usual afternoon cloudiness may drop a couple of light showers.

~~~ As you can tell, by reading the two paragraphs above, there’s nothing much happening here in the Aloha state at this time. I suppose "nothing much happening", in this regard, means just typical late spring weather circumstances. The overlying atmosphere is dry and stable, with a low trade wind inversion across all the islands. This simply means that clouds will remain on the shallow side, inhibiting showers in most areas.

~~~ We have to go out further afield, or in this case, further across the ocean, to find any action here in the Pacific. There’s a tropical storm churning the waters of the western Pacific, called Nakri…here’s a storm tracking map. Looking in the other direction, in the eastern part of the basin, we find an area that has a medium chance of developing into a tropical cyclone…here’s a map of that area. Otherwise, here in the central Pacific, where our hurricane season begins June 1st, we have nothing of the sort brewing.

~~~ Tuesday was a pleasant day in most areas here in the islands. The trade winds were balmy, and just strong enough to keep the volcanic haze at bay on the smaller islands. The Big Island on the other hand, and especially the Kau and Kona Districts, continue to see rather thick vog, making air visibilities and qualities poor there. The plentiful sunshine in most areas, especially along the local beaches, made for a warm to very warm day. There’s nothing unusual this time of year, for the Kahului airport on Maui, to capture the hot spot for the day award…which was 88F degrees Tuesday. I’ll be back very early Wednesday morning with your next new weather narrative from paradise. I hope you have a great Tuesday night wherever you happen to be reading from! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Interesting: U.S. researchers are ramping up their use of unmanned, remote-controlled airplanes this year to penetrate the heart of Atlantic hurricanes in the hope of learning more about what makes the giant storms tick.  But they will be flying the rugged drones from the eastern Caribbean island of Barbados because American aviation authorities won’t let them launch the tiny aircraft from U.S. soil out of concern they could endanger other planes. Nonetheless, storm researchers are confident their drones, which resemble hobbyists’ model airplanes but can be controlled by satellites, will give them a more complete picture of the core of cyclones than they’ve ever had before.  The drones can fly into the eye of a storm just 300 feet above the sea surface and send back a constant stream of temperature, pressure, wind and humidity readings. "It can get measurements we couldn’t get otherwise," said Joe Cione, a research meteorologist with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "That area of the storm is critical because that’s where the maximum winds are. It will give us a better understanding of where the energy is extracted out of the sea." Made by Australia‘s Aerosonde Pty Ltd. and worth between $50,000 and $80,000, the unmanned aircraft measure just 7-feet long, have a 9-foot wingspan, and weigh only 28 pounds.

Interesting2: The ongoing world food crisis has incited riots and protests in more than ten countries over the past several months. In Haiti, seven people were killed in riots that led to the ouster of Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis. Egypt‘s President Mubarak enlisted the army to produce and distribute bread after several people were killed in bakery clashes.

Drought, a declining dollar, and a shift of investment money into commodities have all contributed to bare shelves and empty bellies. The use of cropland for biofuel production has also put pressure on the food supply. At the same time, per capita consumption of meat in the developing world has doubled in the last 20 years, as dietary changes reflect the populations’ expanding wealth. Despite such growth, the average amount of calories consumed or discarded daily in the United States remains several belt notches beyond even some European levels.

Traditional methods of assembly-line meat production require not only ever-increasing inputs of corn, soy, and other grains, but also enormous amounts of energy. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization reported in 2006 that the livestock sector generates 18 percent more greenhouse gas emissions than the transport sector. 

The food crisis is endemic and long term. According to the Guardian, to match the growth in human population "more food will have to be produced worldwide over the next 50 years than has been during the past 10,000 years combined." 

In 1932, Winston Churchill said, "Fifty years hence we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium." The timing of his prediction proved ambitious, but the technology is becoming attainable. 

Animal-free in vitro meat may present a partial solution to hunger. Jason Matheny, director of New Harvest, a nonprofit that funds research on in vitro meat, says that a single cell could produce the annual meat supply for the entire world. And it can be done in a way that’s better for the environment and human health than raising livestock.