Hawaiian Islands Weather details & Aloha paragraphs / November 30-December 1, 2011

Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Wednesday:  

Lihue, Kauai –                   72
Honolulu airport, Oahu –   84   (record high for the date: 89F degrees in 1983)  
Kaneohe, Oahu –               79
Molokai airport –                80
Kahului airport, Maui          71 
Kona airport                      82
Hilo airport, Hawaii –          79

Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountain tops…as of 5pm Wednesday evening:

Honolulu, Oahu – 79
Kaneohe, Oahu – 73

Haleakala Crater – 50 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea –        39 (over 13,500 feet on the Big Island)

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

1.92      Kilohana, Kauai
0.89     Moanalua RG, Oahu
0.10     Molokai
0.00     Lanai
0.11     Kahoolawe
0.07     Ulupalakua, Maui
0.06     Pahoa, Big Island

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 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. This web cam is 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. The Haleakala Crater webcam on Maui just came back online, after being on the blink for several weeks.

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

  Passing showers locally…light to moderate winds
 
 

As this weather map shows, we find a very strong 1042 millibar high pressure system located far to the northeast of the Hawaiian Islands Wednesday night.  This high pressure cell is not too offshore from the Strait of Juan de Fuca, between Vancouver Island, BC…and Washington. This high pressure cell has an elongated ridge of high pressure extending southwest from its center, into the area northeast of our islands.  At the same time, we see a 1012 millibar low pressure system to the north of Hawaii. This low has a cold front front running from its center southwest to near the International Dateline. Finally, there’s a trough of low pressure just  to the east of the islands, which  is slowly migrating westward.

The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph), along with directions Wednesday evening:

10                 Lihue, Kauai – NNE
20                 Kaneohe, Oahu – NNE
22                    Molokai – NNE
16                 Kahoolawe – E
15                 Lipoa, Maui – NNE
15                 Lanai – NE
16                 Upolu Point, Big Island – NE

We can use the following links to see what’s going on in our area of the north central Pacific Ocean early Wednesday evening. Looking at this NOAA satellite picture we find that high and middle level cloudiness is located in most directions, over the ocean…as well as moving over the state from the west at times. We can use this looping satellite image to see low clouds being carried over the islands on the wind flow here and there, with thunderstorms located not too far to the northeast of the islands. Checking out this looping radar image we see a few light showers falling locally over the ocean, most notably along the windward sides.

Sunset Commentary:  There continues to be a few tweaks to the ongoing forecast ideas through the rest of this week, which have now been extended into early next week. The weak cold front that has been slowly moving in our direction to the northwest, is still doing that tonight. It will reach Kauai first, bringing some increase in clouds and showers with it tonight, and perhaps on to Oahu Thursday. The other islands will have some windward biased showers too, although they will be thanks to the moisture being carried our way on the generally north to northeast breezes…rather than the cold front.

Meanwhile, we see the broad swath of high cirrus clouds, which had been over the Big Island, and then south and east of there the last couple of days. This area of icy upper level moisture seems to be slipping further away at the moment, although it could pulse back westward towards us with time. It’s associated with the trough of low pressure that has been migrating westward towards us the last several days. Most of the high stuff over the islands tonight are part of the cirrus area to our north and west.

Several of the computer forecast models are showing a rather deep trough of low pressure forming to the west of the state later this weekend. There are various possibilites of how this will affect our islands, and especially the Kauai end of the island chain. It appears that that side of the Aloha state could eventually become wet, perhaps very wet. The dry side of the state then could be Maui County and the Big Island. It’s still a little early to be nailing anything down in this regard, so perhaps we should let the models spin out a few more ideas before we settle on one or the other. We still have several days to fine tune this possible rainy weather for early next week.

Here in Kihei, Maui at around 6pm Wednesday evening, skies were partly to mostly cloudy. On this last evening of November, there are lots of clouds around, although not much shower activity at the time of this writing. I expect most of the showers that are around, to concentrate their efforts over the Kauai end of the chain through Thursday. The other others will have a few light showers along our windward sides, while the leeward sides will remain dry. I expect this weekend to have pretty decent weather, with light to moderately strong trade winds. As noted above, we may or may not be looking at wetter weather as we push into early next week…stay tuned for more about this prospect. I'll be back early Thursday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a great Wednesday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Interesting:  The rate of global deforestation, mainly the conversion of tropical forests to agricultural land, averaged 14.5 million hectares a year between 1990 and 2005, according to a satellite-based survey released today by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The findings of the global remote sensing survey show that the world’s total forest area in 2005 was 3.69 billion hectares, or 30 per cent of the global land area.

Worldwide, the net loss of forest area between 1990 and 2005 was not as great as previously believed, since gains in forest areas are larger than previously estimated, according to the survey. The net loss — when losses of forest cover are partially offset by afforestation or natural expansion — totalled 72.9 million hectares, or 32 percent less than the previous figure of 107.4 million hectares.

In other words, the planet lost an average of 4.9 million hectares of forest per year, or nearly 10 hectares of forest per minute over the 15-year period. The new data also show that the net loss of forests accelerated, increasing from 4.1 million hectares per year between 1990 and 2000 to 6.4 million hectares between 2000 and 2005.

The figures are based on the most comprehensive use yet of high-resolution satellite data to provide a sample of forests worldwide. They differ from previous findings of the FAO Global Forest Resources Assessment last year, which were based on a compilation of country reports that used a wide variety of sources.