Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Monday:
Lihue, Kauai – 74
Honolulu airport, Oahu – 84 (record high for the date: 88F degrees in 1983)
Kaneohe, Oahu – 80
Molokai airport – 80
Kahului airport, Maui 83
Kona airport 83
Hilo airport, Hawaii – 78
Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountain tops…as of 5pm Monday evening:
Honolulu, Oahu – 80
Hilo, Hawaii – 72
Haleakala Crater – 45 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea – 37 (over 13,500 feet on the Big Island)
Here are the 24-hour precipitation totals (inches) for each of the islands as of Monday afternoon:
0.11 Mount Waialeale, Kauai
0.19 Manoa Lyon Arboretum, Oahu
0.01 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.08 Kahoolawe
0.58 Puu Kukui, Maui
0.73 Piihonua, 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
Late autumn…trade wind weather pattern
As this weather map shows, we find a strong 1038 millibar high pressure system located far to the northeast of the Hawaiian Islands Monday evening. This high pressure cell is located offshore from the Columbia River mouth, between the Oregon and Washington borders. Meanwhile, we see a weaker near 1027 millibar high to the north-northwest of the islands. At the same time, we see a near 1016 millibar gale low pressure system to the north of Hawaii…straddling the 40 degree line of latitude. This low has a frontal cloud band extending from its center south and southwest, to the northwest of the island of Kauai.
The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph), along with directions early Monday evening:
23 Port Allen, Kauai – ENE
22 Honolulu, Oahu – NE
27 Molokai – NE
00 Kahoolawe
27 Kapalua, Maui – NE
24 Lanai – NE
28 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 Monday evening. Looking at this NOAA satellite picture we find that high and middle level cloudiness are located over the ocean to the northeast, east and south of the state. We can use this looping satellite image to see low clouds being carried over the islands on the trade wind flow here and there. At the same time, we find a considerable amount of thunderstorm activity far to our southeast over the ocean, with more high cirrus clouds approaching Kauai from the north-northwest. A weak cold front is located over the ocean to the northwest of Kauai, but won't make it down into our tropical latitudes. Checking out this looping radar image we see showers over the ocean, most of which are in the light to moderately heavy category. The most active precipitation areas are coming into the Big Island and Maui's windward sides…and then across Oahu this evening or during the night.
Sunset Commentary: The main emphasis this week will be the late autumn trade wind flow across the Hawaiian Islands. There will be minor fluctuations in the wind directions and speeds along the way, although in general…maintain a moderately strong stance…with stronger gusts. The computer models have continued to suggest that our local winds may accelerate a bit more this weekend into early next week. This isn’t expected to be a big blow, although the trade winds will likely freshen up a notch or so. As usual, the windward sides will find the strongest breezes, while the leeward sides, at least in most areas, will have lighter winds.
As for precipitation, it will continue to arrive in an off and on manner, along our north and east facing windward coasts and slopes. There don’t appear to be any rainfall enhancing troughs of low pressure around for the time being. The leeward sides may see a few showers, although they will remain on the drier side of the precipitation spectrum. This will continue the drier than normal conditions that much of the state continues to experience so far this year. The models are showing a trough of low pressure forming to the east of the state in a few days…which could trigger wetter conditions in some areas later this weekend.
Here in Kihei, Maui at around 530pm Monday evening, skies were partly cloudy, the majority of which are the middle level altocumulus clouds. These can provide colorful sunsets, so you may want to keep your eyes peeled. As noted above, trade winds will prevail this week, with just windward showers falling at times. We'll find variable clouds, with a mix of high and lower level clouds periodically. ~~~ I'll be back early Tuesday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a great Monday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.
Interesting: Astronomers have confirmed the existence of an Earth-like planet in the "habitable zone" around a star not unlike our own. The planet, Kepler 22-b, lies about 600 light-years away and is about 2.4 times the size of Earth, and has a temperature of about 22C. It is the closest confirmed planet yet to one like ours – an "Earth 2.0".
However, the team does not yet know if Kepler 22-b is made mostly of rock, gas or liquid. During the conference at which the result was announced, the Kepler team said that it had spotted some 1,094 new candidate planets. The Kepler space telescope was designed to look at a fixed swathe of the night sky, staring intently at about 150,000 stars.
The telescope is sensitive enough to see when a planet passes in front of its host star, dimming the star's light by a minuscule amount. Kepler identifies these slight changes in starlight as candidate planets, which are then confirmed by further observations by Kepler and other telescopes in orbit and on Earth.
Kepler 22-b was one of 54 candidates reported by the Kepler team in February, and is just the first to be formally confirmed using other telescopes. More of these "Earth 2.0" candidates are likely to be confirmed in the near future, though a redefinition of the habitable zone's boundaries has brought that number down to 48. Kepler 22-b lies at a distance from its sun about 15% less than the distance from the Earth to the Sun, and its year takes about 290 days.
However, its sun puts out about 25% less light, keeping the planet at its balmy temperature that would support the existence of liquid water. The Kepler team had to wait for three passes of the planet before upping its status from "candidate" to "confirmed".
"Fortune smiled upon us with the detection of this planet," said William Borucki, Kepler principal investigator at Nasa's Ames Research Center. "The first transit was captured just three days after we declared the spacecraft operationally ready. We witnessed the defining third transit over the 2010 holiday season." The results were announced at the Kepler telescope's first science conference, alongside the staggering number of new candidate planets.
The total number of candidates spotted by the telescope is now 2,326 – of which 207 are approximately Earth-sized. In total, the results suggest that planets ranging from Earth-sized to about four times Earth's size – so-called "super-Earths" – may be more common than previously thought.
Interesting2: A heavy fog blanketed parts of northern China on Monday, delaying flights and causing hundreds of cancellations, while smog hung in a dark haze over Beijing. As of 2 p.m. (0600 GMT), 126 flights had been delayed by an hour or longer and 207 were cancelled at Beijing, the world's second-busiest airport, Xinhua news agency said.
The Beijing sky was so dark that many drivers kept their headlights on throughout the day, giving the city an eery, netherworld feeling. "Such super foggy weather looks like the end of the world," commented one microblogger using the name David Jiaoxiaomao.
China's national weather forecaster said the fog was likely to persist across parts of China to Wednesday, causing more transport disruptions. By then, a cold front would begin dispersing the fog, said the forecaster, according to Xinhua. Highways across the northern provinces of Shandong and Hebei were also closed.
In Beijing, the fog has been made worse by pollution. Readings by the U.S. Embassy, which measures inhalable particles of 2.5 microns, have described the pollution for days as "hazardous". On Sunday night, the U.S. Embassy's index topped its ceiling of 500, and it was 356 on Monday afternoon, a reading that was still considered "dangerous".
The Beijing environmental bureau, however, said the air was affected by only "light pollution" during the day. Chinese environmental officials have come under criticism in media reports and on microblogs for reporting only measurements of much larger particles in the air.
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