Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Thursday:
Lihue, Kauai – 85
Honolulu airport, Oahu – 87
Kaneohe, Oahu – 83
Molokai airport – 86
Kahului airport, Maui – 89 (record for Thursday – 94 in 1951)
Kona airport 85
Hilo airport, Hawaii – 85
Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountain tops…as of 5pm Thursday evening:
Honolulu, Oahu – 84
Barking Sands, Kauai – 78
Haleakala Crater – 48 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea Summit – 50 (over 13,500 feet on the Big Island)
Here are the 24-hour precipitation totals (inches) for each of the islands as of Thursday evening:
0.24 Kapahi, Kauai
0.09 Kaneohe, Oahu
0.00 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
0.40 Puu Kukui, Maui
0.40 Pahala, Big Island
Marine Winds – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a 1025 millibar high pressure system far to the northeast of our islands…with its ridge extending southwest to the north of Kauai. Our local trade winds will increasing Friday into Saturday.
Satellite and Radar Images: To view the cloud conditions we have here in Hawaii, please use the following satellite links, starting off with this Infrared Satellite Image of the islands to see all the clouds around during the day and night. This next image is one that gives close images of the islands only during the daytime hours, and is referred to as a Close-up visible image. Finally, here's a Looping IR satellite image, making viewable the clouds around the islands 24 hours a day. To help you keep track of where any showers may be around the islands, here’s the latest animated radar image.
Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,500 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. The tallest peak on the island of Maui is the Haleakala Crater, which is near 10,000 feet in elevation. These two web cams are 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.
Tropical Cyclone activity in the eastern and central Pacific – Here’s the latest weather information coming out of the National Hurricane Center, covering the eastern north Pacific. You can find the latest tropical cyclone information for the central north Pacific (where Hawaii is located) by clicking on this link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center. A satellite image, which shows the entire ocean area between Hawaii and the Mexican coast…can be found here. Here's a tropical cyclone tracking map for the eastern and central Pacific.
Aloha Paragraphs
Trade winds picking up into the weekend –
Surf rising on our north and west shores / High
surf advisory for south shores Friday
The trade winds will rebound tonight into Friday onwards. Glancing at this weather map, we find a near 1025 millibar high pressure system far to the northeast of our islands. A high pressure ridge runs southwest from its center, to the north of the state. The forecast continues to suggest that our winds will be on the increase well into next week. The forecast then shows a light to moderately strong trade wind flow Friday, increasing through the weekend.
Our trade winds will be picking back up now…the following numbers represent the strongest gusts (mph), along with directions Thursday evening:
14 Princeville, Kauai – E
17 Kahuku, Oahu – ENE
16 Molokai – SW
23 Kahoolawe – SE
23 Kahului, Maui – NE
07 Lanai – NW
27 Upolu airport, Big Island – NE
We can use the following links to see what’s going on in our area of the north central Pacific Ocean Thursday night. Looking at this NOAA satellite picture we find scattered clouds, over the ocean for the most part…although being carried ashore by the increasing trade winds now. We can use this looping satellite image to see the low clouds moving along in the strengthening easterly trade wind flow…with thunderstorms and high clouds situated well offshore from Hawaii…mostly far to the northwest. Checking out this looping radar image we see some showers around…falling mostly over the ocean offshore from the islands…although coming in towards the Big Island at the time of this writing.
Sunset Commentary: We’ve moved through the last day of this light wind regime, and its associated convective weather pattern. Clear mornings leading to afternoon clouds and localized showers were the name of the game the last several days. This late summer transition from the common trade wind weather pattern was thanks to a big storm, which migrated into the Gulf of Alaska, far to our north. This low pressure system spun out a cold front, which according to this weather map, now extends out of a whole host of low pressure systems…seven at last count! By the way, the first rather large north-northwest swell, which will be pounding our north and west shores into Friday, was generated by that big low in the Gulf earlier this week.
This frontal boundary, in turn pushed our trade wind producing high pressure ridge down to within a hundred miles of our islands. This is the reason our winds were so light. As this front pulls northward tonight into Friday, our ridge will follow northward…in the fronts wake. As this happens, we'll see the return of strengthening trade winds now, most noticeably around Maui County and the Big Island. As we push into the weekend, those trade winds will become stronger into next week. There has been some talk that small craft wind advisories may be needed around Maui and the Big Island by Monday or Tuesday.
As the trade winds come back around now, we will see the shift back into a more normal late summer situation. This has been our first sign of autumn, although it won’t be our last by any means. One of these days a cold front will reach Kauai, and we’ll see our winds going Kona ahead of it. This autumn and winter will bear signs of La Nina, like we saw last year. This could bring us somewhat more than the normal amount of rainfall again…which would help us avoid drought conditions next summer. La Nina also helps to limit our tropical cyclone activity here in the Pacific Ocean, although just the opposite is true in the Atlantic Ocean now!
Here in Kihei, Maui at 530pm HST Thursday evening, skies were partly cloudy in general. As noted above, the trade winds will return now, and were already gusting this evening to near 30 mph on the Big Island, to 23 mph in a couple of spots in Maui County. The other thing that we need to be aware of is the high surf conditions that will be spreading along our leeward south shores during the day Friday. This will be large, enough so that a high surf advisory begins Friday morning…lasting through much of the weekend. This surf will make the west shores larger than normal as well. Then, we have moderately high surf conditions along our north shores too, which was generated by the storm in the Gulf of Alaska earlier this week. Otherwise, our weather will be fine Friday into the weekend, with more showers along our windward sides than we've seen the last several days. ~~~ I'll be back early Friday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a great Thursday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.
Interesting: King crabs, with their crushing claws and ecosystem-altering habits, have shown up in the warming waters of a deep basin in the Antarctic continental shelf, raising worries they'll hurt other species there. "It looks like a pretty negative consequence of climate warming in the Antarctic," said Craig Smith, a professor of oceanography at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, who led the research into the new crab population, estimated at 1.6 million, in the Palmer Deep.
This species of crab, Neolithodes yaldwyni, is known to populate Antarctica's Ross Sea, which lies south of New Zealand. The Palmer Deep, a pocket in the relatively shallow continental shelf, lies south of South America. The discovery of a king crab population there suggests that, after millennia of apparently being held at bay by the cold water of the continental shelf, the crabs can now cross it.
The worry is that king crabs will threaten the unusual, isolated animal life established on the seafloor of the shelf. The research team saw evidence of this when they deployed a remotely operated vehicle to survey the Palmer Deep. While they found no evidence that the invasive species was living on the shallower, colder shelf, they warned that it could take hold there within two decades.
In the Palmer Deep, they saw that the crabs had disturbed sediment on the basin seafloor by digging for worms and other creatures, an alteration that affects other animals' habitat. The predatory crabs also feed on other invertebrates, like sea lilies and basket stars. These and other creatures were absent from depths below 3,117 feet where the crabs were found.
The deeper the water, the warmer it is, the result of warmer water coming in from the north, Smith explained. The incoming water is saltier and denser, so it sinks below the cooler waters. It appears the crabs are limited by temperatures approaching 34.5 F, though the team found crabs living in basin waters colder than 34.5 degrees Fahrenheit and there is evidence that some members of this species can live at even colder temperatures.
The Palmer Deep is located near the West Antarctic Peninsula, an area experiencing rapid warming. Below 2,625 feet in the Palmer Deep, temperatures have been increasing at a rate of about 0.018 degrees Fahrenheit per year for almost 30 years. Given the warming trend, these crabs could move up onto the shelf within one to two decades, according to the researchers.
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