Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Monday:

82   Lihue, Kauai
88   Honolulu, Oahu 
86   Molokai
90   Kahului, Maui – record highest Monday…93 back in 1984, 1996
87   Kailua Kona
86   Hilo, Hawaii

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

0.44   Mount Waialeale, Kauai
0.44   Mililani, Oahu
0.00   Makapulapai, Molokai
0.00   Lanai
0.00   Kahoolawe
0.01   Kepuni, Maui
0.18   Kealakekua, Big Island


The following numbers represent the strongest wind gusts (mph)…as of Monday evening:


15   Poipu, Kauai
29   Oahu Forest NWR, Oahu
27   Molokai
18   Lanai
33   Kahoolawe
16   Kaupo Gap, Maui
24   South Point, Big Island


Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,800 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.



Aloha Paragraphs




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http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/west/hi/ir4.jpg


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Tropical storm Ana continues moving away…west of Kauai.


Topical Storm Warning…waters beyond 40 nautical miles
out to 240 nautical miles



~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~




Our local winds will become lighter over the next few days…with stronger trade winds expected by the weekend. Here’s the latest weather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean, along with a real-time wind profiler of the central Pacific. We find a high pressure system to the north-northeast. An approaching cold front will push a ridge of high pressure down closer to the state, thus the lighter wind flow. Meanwhile, tropical storm Ana is located over the ocean well to the west of Kauai.  As Ana continues to move further away, our wind directions will range between southeast and easterly over the next few days…followed by strengthening trade winds later this week.

Satellite imagery shows high clouds over the Kauai end of the state…with showers increasing along our windward sides Tuesday night into Wednesday Looking at this larger looping satellite image, it shows still prominent tropical storm 02C (Ana) to our west…having a counter-clockwise spin. Meanwhile, this looping radar image shows fewer showers falling over the ocean to the west…with a few elsewhere in places. Weather will improve, although with increasing windward biased showers Tuesday evening into Wednesday. I’ll be back with updates on all of the above and below, I hope you have a great Monday night wherever you happen to be spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

~~~ Tropical Storm Ana continues to gradually weaken, and isn’t expected to strengthen back into a hurricane. The Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC) official forecast track has Ana spinning by  to the west of the islands, leaving an area of showers over the ocean in its wake. The strongest winds are well offshore, sustained to 50 mph near the center…with higher gusts. A turn towards the north and then northeast will take the center of Ana further and further from our islands. The major threat of Ana has definitely passed, as weather conditions normalize here in Hawaii. Rainfall totals for what was Hurricane Ana.

World-wide tropical cyclone activity:


>>> Atlantic Ocean: There are no active tropical cyclones


A large non-tropical low is located over the far eastern Atlantic
Ocean a few hundred miles south-southeast of the Azores. This system
is producing winds of gale-force and could gradually acquire some
subtropical characteristics during the next day or so while it moves
slowly westward. Upper-level winds are forecast to become less
conducive for subtropical or tropical cyclone formation by Thursday
and development after that time is not likely.


* Formation chance through 48 hours…low…10 percent
* Formation chance through 5 days…low…10 percent


Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean

>>> Caribbean Sea: There are no active tropical cyclones


Satellite images and surface observations indicate that the area of
low pressure in the southern Bay of Campeche has become better
defined. Although the associated showers and thunderstorms are
currently not well organized, this system has the potential to
become a tropical cyclone during the next day or so while it moves
slowly eastward toward the western Yucatan Peninsula. Later in the
week, the low is forecast to interact and possibly merge with a
frontal system over the southeastern Gulf of Mexico or northwestern
Caribbean Sea. An Air Force Reserve reconnaissance aircraft is
scheduled to investigate the disturbance this afternoon. Interests
in the Yucatan Peninsula should monitor the progress of this system.


* Formation chance through 48 hours…medium…40 percent
* Formation chance through 5 days…high…50 percent


>>> Gulf of Mexico: There are no active tropical cyclones


Here’s a satellite image of the Caribbean Sea…and the Gulf of Mexico.

>>> Eastern Pacific:  There are no active tropical cyclones


Here’s a wide satellite image that covers the entire area between Mexico, out through the central Pacific…to the International Dateline.


Here’s the link to the National Hurricane Center (NHC)


>>> Central Pacific: Tropical Storm 02C (Ana) remains active, located approximately 425 miles west of Lihue, Kauai…with sustained winds of near 50 mph…with higher gusts. Here’s a graphical track map…along with a satellite image – and what the computer models are showing


Here’s a link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC)


>>> Northwest Pacific Ocean: There are no active tropical cyclones


>>> South Pacific Ocean: There are no active tropical cyclones

>>> North and South Indian Oceans: There are no active tropical cyclones

Here’s a link to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC)

 

Interesting: How did Icebergs reach Florida in the last Ice Age? – Using a first-of-its-kind, high-resolution numerical model to describe ocean circulation during the last ice age about 21,000 year ago, oceanographer Alan Condron of the University of Massachusetts Amherst has shown that icebergs and meltwater from the North American ice sheet would have regularly reached South Carolina and even southern Florida. The models are supported by the discovery of iceberg scour marks on the sea floor along the entire continental shelf.


Such a view of past meltwater and iceberg movement implies that the mechanisms of abrupt climate change are more complex than previously thought, Condron says. “Our study is the first to show that when the large ice sheet over North America known as the Laurentide ice sheet began to melt, icebergs calved into the sea around Hudson Bay and would have periodically drifted along the east coast of the United States as far south as Miami and the Bahamas in the Caribbean, a distance of more than 3,100 miles, about 5,000 kilometers.”


His work, conducted with Jenna Hill of Coastal Carolina University, is described in the current advance online issue of Nature Geosciences. “Determining how far south of the subpolar gyre icebergs and meltwater penetrated is vital for understanding the sensitivity of North Atlantic Deep Water formation and climate to past changes in high-latitude freshwater runoff,” the authors say.


Hill analyzed high-resolution images of the sea floor from Cape Hatteras to Florida and identified about 400 scour marks on the seabed that were formed by enormous icebergs plowing through mud on the sea floor. These characteristic grooves and pits were formed as icebergs moved into shallower water and their keels bumped and scraped along the ocean floor.


“The depth of the scours tells us that icebergs drifting to southern Florida were at least 1,000 feet, or 300 meters thick,” says Condron. “This is enormous. Such icebergs are only found off the coast of Greenland today.”


To investigate how icebergs might have drifted as far south as Florida, Condron simulated the release of a series of glacial meltwater floods in his high-resolution ocean circulation model at four different levels for two locations, Hudson Bay and the Gulf of St. Lawrence.