Hawaiian Islands weather details & Aloha paragraphs

Aloha Paragraphs



Kihei, Maui…breezy afternoons
Photo Credit: Flickr.com

The trade winds will remain steady, with minor fluctuations in terms wind speeds through the next week. The latest weather map shows a 1029 millibar high pressure system located far to the northeast of Hawaii Monday evening. These trade winds will remain on the light side Tuesday…then increase again by mid-week through the rest of the week. The trade winds will blow generally in the light to locally moderate levels through Tuesday, then increase more fully into the moderately strong category starting Wednesday.

These light trade winds will blow some showers onto our windward sides at times. The leeward sides in contrast, will generally remain dry, although with possible upcountry afternoon showers. There’s a chance that the remnant moisture from former eastern Pacific tropical cyclone Boris, may bring an increase in clouds and windward showers to the islands around the middle of the week…although mostly on the Big Island and possibly Maui. This isn’t a sure thing, as the slug of tropical moisture may remain to the south of the state.



~~~ Our weather here in the Hawaiian Islands will remain just fine through Tuesday. The leeward sides of the islands in particular, will be great, with great sun tanning potentials along those sandy beaches. Daytime high temperatures will be rising well into the 80F’s, with those hottest areas reaching perhaps 90F degrees…or even a degree or two higher. The lighter trade winds will have us feeling pretty hot during the days…with slightly cooler early mornings.

~~~ The windward sides will find favorably inclined weather too, although, as usual, there will be more wind blowing there. At the same time, that wind will help to carry clouds ashore, brought in from the ocean to our east. These clouds will spill a few showers at times, but nothing remarkable is expected. The windward slopes will find the heaviest rainfall, although again most areas will find light amounts…most leeward beaches remaining totally dry. 

~~~ It’s early Monday evening here in Kihei, Maui. Monday was a lovely day here in the islands, with pretty much maximum sunshine, in contrast to the minimum amount of clouds and showers. As this satellite image shows, we have that area of tropical moisture out to the east-southeast, which may or may not bring some increase in moisture to the southern part of the state in about 48 hours or so. The latest computer model runs are now suggesting that that moisture source may slide by south of the Big Island, which is too bad, as the very dry conditions statewide continue. In a more immediate sense, we should see some increase in windward biased showers overnight into Tuesday morning. All things considered however, weather conditions will generally remain quite nice, which is typical of the early summer season. I’ll be back very early Tuesday, with your next new weather narrative. I hope you have a great Monday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Interesting: In China’s Olympic co-host city Qingdao, sea breezes that usually bring relief from baking summer temperatures now bring a cloying stench from a massive algae bloom that locals fear will harm the city’s bucolic image during the Games. "If we don’t clean this up, we’re done for," said local businessman Zhang Longfei, pointing at a blanket of green weed stretching far out to sea at Qingdao‘s No. 3 Bathing Beach.  "You think tourists and Games visitors want to see this?" Zhang said, taking a break after lugging a sack full of green weed onto a growing pile offshore. Zhang is one of an army of troops, marine officials and common volunteers battling to clean Qingdao‘s shores as the host city for Olympic sailing events enters peak tourist season and puts the final touches on Games preparations.

Local authorities say 30,000 people and have now been drafted into the cause, and have drawn a line in the sand demanding that the algae, which invaded Qingdao in mid-June, be completely expunged from sailing competition areas by July 15. On beaches usually packed with sun-seeking Chinese tourists, khaki-clad troops and sweaty volunteers strive to shift mounds of green weed washed in by the tide. The epic battle is winnable, officials insist, at least within the confines of the sailing competition area, currently being reinforced with 32 km (20 miles) of marine fencing. "I’m absolutely confident that our government can take effective measures to clean, not only the venue area, but also protect the beautiful beaches, Yuan Zhiping, assistant to the president of the Qingdao Sailing Committee, told Reuters. Sailing events are scheduled to start on August 9.

Interesting2: Like the wavy lines and snowy static that dance across old TV screens, your brain generates noise. Neuroscientists had thought that this brain noise, detectable by researchers using high-tech gear, wasn’t important to the goings-on in your noggin. It was also suspected that this noise would decline with age as children grew up and their mental processes became more efficient. But new research suggests that noise actually increases with age and is a sign of greater complexity in the brain. Researchers at the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care in Toronto had a group of 79 people complete a series of face memory tasks, measuring how well they were able to accurately recall faces. The participants represented two age groups, children (ages 8 to 15) and young adults (ages 20 to 33).

While they were performing the task, EEG (electroencephalography) recordings were taken to measure the precise timing of brain activity. The young adults scored better on the tasks than the children, showing that their memory was better and their performance more reliable. But they didn’t have less noise than the children — in fact, they had more. "What we discovered is that brain maturation not only leads to more stable and accurate behavior in the performance of a memory task, but correlates with increased brain signal variability," said study leader Randy McIntosh. "This doesn’t mean the brain is working less efficiently. It’s showing greater functional variability, which is indicative of enhanced neural complexity."

Interesting3: The southern Argentine glacier Perito Moreno was set to fracture Monday, in a rare collapse during the winter in the southern hemisphere. Give the unusual timing for this spectacular natural phenomenon, foreign tourists did not gather by the thousand in the area, as has happened in other years. It was mostly a local crowd who waited to see how the glacier – a natural dike into the lake Lago Argentino, made of millions of tonnes of ice – breaks in a deafening crash. Despite the snow, the rain and very low temperatures, some 1,500 people travelled 80 kilometres on dirt roads from the town of El Calafate to the glacier, inside the Glaciers National Park. The glacier started to let water in on Friday, and a tunnel was created through the ice whose roof was expected to collapse Monday. The Perito Moreno, in the Argentine Patagonian province of Santa Cruz, is one of the few still-growing glaciers in the world.

In the process, it dams up large masses of water. There is a difference of up to 30 metres in altitude between water on the two sides of the ice barrier, which can be up to 60 metres high itself. Large blocks of ice have already collapsed in recent days, and the definitive crash appeared imminent Monday, Argentine media reported. Recent episodes of the phenomenon were to be seen in 2004 and 2006, when the ice barrier collapsed causing a huge avalanche of water. The region, some 2,500 kilometres south-west of Buenos Aires, is very thinly populated, and the phenomenon does not pose risks for people or property.