Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Wednesday…along with the minimums Wednesday:

76 – 65  Lihue, Kauai
78 – 65  Honolulu, Oahu
74 – 63  Molokai AP
78 – 65  Kahului AP, Maui
80 – 73  Kailua Kona
76 – 68  Hilo AP, Hawaii

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

0.28  Kokee, Kauai
0.51  Makaha Stream, Oahu
3.29  Puu Alii, Molokai
0.00  Lanai
0.01  Kahoolawe
2.66  West Wailuaiki, Maui
2.47  Kawainui Stream, Big Island

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

32  Lihue, Kauai – N
47  Kuaokala, Oahu – NNE
31  Molokai – NNE
40  Lanai – NE
50  Kahaloowe – NNE
36  Kapalua, Maui – N 
39  Kohala Ranch, Big Island – NE

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

http://weather.unisys.com/satellite/sat_ir_enh_west_loop-12.gif
A cold front has stalled just offshore to the southeast of the Big Island

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/west/cpac/ir4.jpg
Residual clouds from the recent frontal cloud band…over Maui
and the Big Island’s windward sides

 

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/west/hi/ir4.jpg
Clouds in the wake of the cold front’s passage…are keeping
partly to mostly cloudy skies over the eastern islands, with
good clearing along the leeward sides

 

http://radar.weather.gov/Conus/RadarImg/hawaii.gif
Showers mostly over Maui County and the Big Island’s
windward sides – looping radar image


Small Craft Wind Advisory…all coasts and channel waters

 Wind Advisory…windiest areas around the state –
20-30 with gusts to 50 mph

Gale Warning..windiest coasts and channels around the
Big Island and Maui County

 

~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~



Winds remaining strong from the north and northeast…in the wake of the recent cold front into Thursday. Here’s the latest weather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean. We find high pressure systems northeast and northwest of the state. At the same time, there’s a ridge of high pressure now located to the north of the islands. In the wake of the recent cold front we’ll continue to see strong and gusty north to northeast winds for several more days. This wind direction will bring cooler weather into the state. The outlook calls for lighter easterly trade winds later this week, into the weekend. The trades will taper off ahead of the next cold front…arriving early next week.

The recent cold front is now located just south of the Big Island…with windward showers continuing in its wake over the Big Island and Maui. The latest forecast continues to show a notable period of chilly and windy weather in the wake of this cold front…keeping off and on passing shower activity along our windward sides for several days. The leeward sides should be in better shape, although locally windy and cool, with an occasional shower being carried into those areas on the gusty winds at times. Fairly typical, late winter trade wind conditions will return by the weekend…with the usual passing windward showers. The models are now pointing out yet another cold front arriving over the state early next week.

Marine environment details: A gale warning remains active for the typically windiest waters around Maui County and the Big Island. A small craft advisory remains posted for all remaining coastal waters. Trade winds will taper off a bit later in the week…on into the weekend.

The current northwest swell will lower gradually overnight, although linger through Thursday night. A small north-northwest swell will arrive Thursday night and Friday, then lower gradually into Saturday. A bit larger north-northwest swell will fill in late Saturday and Sunday, with advisory level surf expected. This swell will then lower gradually into early next week.

Choppy surf will be on the increase along east facing shores over the next few days…due to the breezy trade winds. These rough conditions are expected to continue through the weekend. Early season south swells will continue to provide surf along south facing shores over the next several days.

Here’s a wind profile…of the offshore waters around the islands – with a closer view

Here’s the Hawaiian Islands Sulfate Aerosol…animated graphic – showing vog forecast

 

https://manoa.hawaii.edu/exploringourfluidearth/sites/default/files/M1U4-Fig4.8-seastates_sizedown.jpg


Here in Maui County...It was clear to mostly cloudy early this Wednesday morning, depending upon location…with showers or drizzle falling along the windward sides, and elsewhere in a few areas. Skies are considerably less hazy now, with almost all the vog now blown away! Here in upcountry Kula, at my place, it’s been windy all night, and the air temperature was 51.4F degrees well before sunrise. The temperature at near the same time was 66 degrees down in Kahului under cloudy skies, 64 out in Hana with light rain, 64 at Maalaea Bay, and 41 atop the Haleakala summit. Meanwhile, Kahoolawe was 61 degrees, 62 at Lanai City, with 65 at the Molokai airport…with cloudy skies. / 945am here in Kula, it’s windy and cool (56 degrees), with drizzle and mist blowing through. I can see sunshine down along the leeward sides, with clouds and showers along the windward sides…brrr / 1050am, very windy, cool 59 degrees, which feels cooler than that with the dry air and wind chill factor! I can still see a bit of some kind of haze down in the central valley as well.

– Windy, windy, windy, at least in those areas exposed to the strong and gusty north winds. There are lots of low clouds and off and on drizzle and mist along the windward sides…while the leeward sides are sunny. Here in upcountry Kula, it’s windy, sunny, and cool, with a temperature of only 60.6 degrees at 415pm.

– Still very windy, not only here on Maui, but statewide, with gusts up to…and even approaching 60 mph during the day! I can still see the misty low clouds banked up against the windward coasts and slopes, while the leeward sides remained sunny today. The temperature here in upper Kula hovered around 60 degrees all day, which is especially cool for anytime of year. Now at 630pm, the air temperature is just 59.1 degrees here at my Kula weather tower, although with the very low humidity level, and the wind chill factor…it feels way cooler than that! I’d suggest throwing that extra blanket on the bed tonight, maybe even pull on a pair of socks before jumping into bed. / Now at 755pm, here in Kula again, it’s freezing! Well, the temperature isn’t 32 degrees, although it feels like it…with 51.9 showing on my outdoor temperature sensor! The winds are still howling, and if the wind weren’t so strong, the temperature would be lower still.


World-wide tropical cyclone activity:

>>> Atlantic Ocean: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2015 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2016. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued if conditions warrant. Here’s the 2015 hurricane season summary

Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean

>>> Caribbean Sea: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2015 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2016. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued if conditions warrant.

>>> Gulf of Mexico: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2015 Atlantic hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on June 1, 2016. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued if conditions warrant.

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

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

>>> Eastern Pacific: The last regularly scheduled Tropical Weather Outlook of the 2015 North Pacific hurricane season…has occurred. Routine issuance of the Tropical Weather Outlook will resume on May 15, 2016. During the off-season, Special Tropical Weather Outlooks will be issued if conditions warrant. Here’s the 2015 hurricane season summary

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: The central north Pacific hurricane season has officially ended. Routine issuance of the tropical weather outlook will resume on June 1, 2016. During the off-season, special tropical weather outlooks will be issued if conditions warrant. Here’s the 2015 hurricane season summary

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 / Arabian Sea: There are no active tropical cyclones

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


Interesting: Study suggests impact of climate change on agriculture may be underestimated – Studies of how climate change might affect agriculture generally look only at crop yields — the amount of product harvested from a given unit of land. But climate change may also influence how much land people choose to farm and the number of crops they plant each growing season. A new study takes all of these variables into account, and suggests researchers may be underestimating the total effect of climate change on the world’s food supply.

One of the most critical questions surrounding climate change is how it might affect the food supply for a growing global population. A new study by researchers from Brown and Tufts universities suggests that researchers have been overlooking how two key human responses to climate — how much land people choose to farm, and the number of crops they plant — will impact food production in the future.

The study, published in Nature Climate Change, focused on the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso, an emerging global breadbasket that as of 2013 supplied 10 percent of the world’s soybeans. The researchers used variations in temperature and precipitation across the state over an eight-year period to estimate the sensitivity of the region’s agricultural production to climate change. Those historical comparisons can help in making predictions about the sensitivity of agriculture to future climate change.

The study found that, if the patterns from 2002 to 2008 hold in the future, an increase in average temperature in Mato Grosso of just 1 degree Celsius will lead to a nine to 13 percent reduction in overall production of soy and corn. “This is worrisome given that the temperature in the study region is predicted to rise by as much as 2 degrees by mid-century under the range of plausible greenhouse gas emissions scenarios,” said Avery Cohn, assistant professor of environment and resource policy at Tufts, who led the work while he was a visiting researcher at Brown.

But the study’s broader implications stem from the mechanisms behind the changes in agricultural output. Most studies of this kind look only at the extent to which climate shocks affect crop yield—the amount of product harvested from a given unit of agricultural land. But by only looking at that single variable, researchers can miss critical dynamics that can affect overall output, says Leah VanWey, professor of sociology at Brown and senior deputy director of the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society (IBES).

“If you look at yields alone, you’re not looking at all of the information because there are economic and social changes going on as well,” said VanWey, one of the study’s senior authors. “You’re not taking into account farmers’ reactions to climate shocks.”

For example, farmers may react to decreasing yields by putting less land area into production because it’s simply not profitable. Farmers may also vary the number of crops they plant in a growing season. Double cropping—the planting of two successive crops in the same field in the same growing season—is common in Mato Grosso. If the weather is bad, farmers may alter their decision to plant a second crop.

For this new study, the researchers looked not only at crop yield, but also at year-to-year variation in crop area and double cropping. To develop those additional datasets, Cohn and VanWey worked with Jack Mustard, professor of earth, environmental and planetary sciences at Brown, and graduate student Stephanie Spera. Mustard and Spera gathered imagery of the Mato Grosso region from NASA’s MODIS satellite, which monitors land cover and land use all over the world.

In the satellite data, cropland is identified as areas that turn green during the growing season, and then quickly become brown, indicating a harvest. Two green-ups in the same growing season indicate the land is being double-cropped.

“The changes in cropping that we quantified with remotely sensed data were stunning,” Mustard said. “We can use those satellite data to better understand what’s happening from a climate, economic, and sociological standpoint.”

The study showed that temperature increases of 1 degree Celsius were associated with substantial decreases in both total crop area and double cropping. In fact, those decreases accounted for 70 percent of the overall loss in production found in the study. Only the remaining 30 percent was attributable to crop yield.

“Had we looked at yield alone, as most studies do, we would have missed the production losses associated with these other variables,” VanWey said.

Taken together, the results suggest that traditional studies “may be underestimating the magnitude of the link between climate and agricultural production,” Cohn said.

That’s especially true in places like Brazil, where agricultural subsidies are scarce compared with places like the U.S.

“This is an agricultural frontier in the tropics in a middle-income country,” VanWey said. “This is where the vast majority of agricultural development is going to happen in the next 30 to 50 years. So understanding how people respond in this kind of environment is going to be really important.”

VanWey said a next step for this line of research might be to repeat it in the U.S. to see if increased subsidies or insurance help to guard against these kinds of shocks. If so, it might inform policy decisions in emerging agricultural regions like Mato Grosso.

“We may need to figure out a way to create incentives — credit products or insurance — that can reduce farmers’ responses to climate shocks,” VanWey said.

Funding for the research was provided by NASA