Air Temperatures – The following high temperatures (F) were recorded across the state of Hawaii Monday…along with the low temperatures Monday:

77 – 65  Lihue, Kauai
81 – 65  Honolulu, Oahu
84 – 66  Molokai AP
78 – 68  Kahului AP, Maui
82 – 67  Kailua Kona AP
77 – 68  Hilo AP, Hawaii

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

0.01  Waialae, Kauai
0.02  Punaluu Stream, Oahu
 0.40  Molokai
0.01  Lanai
0.00  Kahoolawe
1.25  West Wailuaiki, Maui
4.60  Saddle Quarry, Big Island

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

13  Poipu, Kauai
24  Kuaokala, Oahu
15  Molokai
20  Lanai
25  Kahoolawe
21  Maalaea Bay, Maui
27  Kealakomo, Big Island

Here’s a wind profile of the Pacific Ocean – Closer view of the islands

Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live webcam on the summit of our tallest mountain Mauna Kea (nearly 13,800 feet high) on the Big Island of Hawaii. This webcam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands, and at night whenever there’s a big moon shining down. Also, at night you will be able to see the stars — and the sunrise and sunset too — depending upon weather conditions.


Aloha Paragraphs

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Low pressure systems well northwest through northeast of the islands, with associated cold fronts draping southwest from their centers

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Clouds over windward sections, clearing leeward areas…with the next cold front approaching to the north

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Low clouds bringing windward showers to the islands locally, clear to partly cloudy leeward…and the leading edge of the approaching cold front is now is closer view

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Just a few minor showers locally – Looping radar image


~~~ Hawaii Weather Narrative ~~~

 

The winds will weaken into the middle of this week…then become cooler and increase some thereafter. Here’s the latest weather map, showing a weak high pressure cell very near the islands. A new moderately strong high pressure system, not far to the northwest, is pushing a cold front towards Hawaii. At the same time we see low pressure centers to the north-northeast and north of Hawaii, with their trailing cold fronts stretching into the area north of the islands. As we get into the middle of the week, our winds will become even lighter…as the next weak cold front will move down through the state during the second half of the work week. Cooler northeasterly winds will follow in the wake of the cold front by the weekend into early next week.

Showers will focus their efforts along our windward coasts and slopes…although hardly any now. Cool and mainly dry weather will prevail across the state into Tuesday. We’ll see the next cold front approach the state around later Tuesday into early Wednesday…bringing windward showers our way for a couple of days. The front is expected to reach Kauai early Wednesday, then push southward through Oahu into Wednesday night, Maui County Wednesday night into Thursday, and through the Big Island Thursday night into Friday. We should see an increase in showers particularly for the windward areas, in association with the front as it moves down the island chain, although some of the showers are expected to reach leeward areas here and there. Drier and cooler weather will arrive in the wake of this front into the weekend. However, the models are now showing yet another winter cold front approaching the islands early next week.

Marine environment details: Latest high-resolution model guidance shows winds decreasing below 25 knots across the entire coastal waters, and the previous small craft advisory for the Alenuihaha Channel will be dropped. Winds are forecast to remain below advisory levels across the coastal waters today through the work week. Seas may rise across windward waters from late Tuesday night through Wednesday evening…as a north-northwest swell moves through the area.

A north-northeast swell will remain near peak levels this morning, then decline this afternoon before fading away tonight into Tuesday, with resulting surf expected to remain below advisory levels for north and east facing shores. Another somewhat larger north swell will arrive late Tuesday night and peak on Wednesday. The resulting surf should remain just below advisory levels for north facing shores. A small south-southwest swell will arrive Tuesday and continue into Wednesday, producing a slight rise in the surf on south facing shores.

The ongoing north-northeast swell may cause surges in north- facing harbors on Maui and the Big Island. A Marine Weather Statement remains in effect for today as a result.

 

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World-wide tropical cyclone activity…with storms showing up when active


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>>> Atlantic Ocean: The 2016 hurricane season has ended

Here’s a satellite image of the Atlantic Ocean

>>> Caribbean: The 2016 hurricane season has ended

>>> Gulf of Mexico: The 2016 hurricane season has ended

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 2016 hurricane season has ended

Here’s the NOAA 2016 Hurricane Season Summary for the Eastern Pacific Basin

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 2016 hurricane season has ended

Here’s the NOAA 2016 Hurricane Season Summary for the Central Pacific Basin

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

>>> Northwest Pacific Ocean: No active tropical cyclones

>>> South Pacific Ocean: No active tropical cyclones


>>> North and South Indian Oceans / Arabian Sea: No active tropical cyclones

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


Interesting Biologist’s ant research provides long-term look at effects of climate change – The world of forest ants may provide a macrocosm of the complex reactions and interactions among species affected by global climate change, according to a research project involving Bowling Green State University biologist Dr. Shannon Pelini.

As escalating amounts of carbon dioxide are introduced into the atmosphere, a chain reaction is induced, leading to increasingly warmer temperatures, Pelini said. This is taking place at an alarming rate, making it more important than ever that we understand how climate change will affect our natural world.

Many scientists have attempted to tackle this issue by determining the thermal tolerance of various species, then predicting what will happen to them as our world warms. However, this approach as a way to understand nature has its drawbacks because one species never acts alone. Individuals are constantly interacting with other species and the environment in which they live, so comprehending how global change impacts these interactions is crucial to a holistic understanding.

Pelini and her colleagues have made significant progress in this direction with their new study, “Climatic Warming Destabilizes Forest Ant Communities,” which looks at complex interactions of ant communities and their responses to warming. The study was published in the Oct. 26 edition of the journal Science Advances.

Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Program for Ecosystem Research and the National Science Foundation, the long-term experiment looked at the interactions ants exhibit over nesting structures in two distinctly different geographical areas. As a postdoctoral researcher at Harvard University, and in collaboration with investigators from the University of Vermont, the University of Tennessee and North Carolina State University, Pelini designed and built large warming chambers within Harvard Forest in Massachusetts. These chambers were also replicated in Duke Forest in North Carolina to provide a comparison to the cooler Harvard Forest.

“It’s one of the biggest climate change experiments in the entire world, which is a really exciting thing to be a part of,” Pelini said. “We were shooting for understanding what goes on with ant communities that exist in a cooler northern latitude and how their responses compare to the same suite of species in populations that occur in the warmer lower latitude.”

The researchers, led by Dr. Sarah Diamond, now an assistant professor of biology at Case Western Reserve University, placed artificial nest boxes in the warming chambers and checked them once a month for five years to measure which species of ants were utilizing them. They were interested to see if the ant species in the nest boxes would differ depending on the intensity of the warming treatment.

“We literally put heaters around the forest floor and warmed the ant communities up to see what would happen so we could more precisely ask how extinction and colonization and occupancy of these local habitats change,” Pelini said.

In fact, Pelini and her colleagues found some interesting and unexpected results. In warmer chambers, there was more occupancy of heat-loving ants, which is intuitive. However, less expected was the amount of time those ants were remaining in one single nest. Typically, ant colonies are constantly competing with each other for prime nest habitat, which promotes resilience to environmental changes within the community. When one ant species, like the heat-lovers, remains in a nest for a long time, there is less resilience in the community and so it is more likely to fall apart following a disturbance event, Pelini said.

According to Pelini, these results occurred for two reasons. First, warming will create an environment that preferentially selects organisms with broader or higher thermal tolerances. Second, those species that will do well under warming conditions will also have more opportunities to interact with other species that may or may not do as well under those conditions. The latter is something that current climate change models cannot capture because they do not focus on the community as a whole.

“I think the most exciting part of this experiment is being able to just watch the community and how it responded,” Pelini said.

Ants play an important role in the ecosystem of forests, dispersing seeds and keeping soil aerated and as a food source for other animals, Pelini said.

Although the study provided a new understanding of how climate change is going to influence a group of vital invertebrates that inhabit our soil, there is still much more to understand about this system and how it will respond to change.

“Ants are very charismatic; we know a lot about their natural history, their physiology, and their ecology,” Pelini said. “And I think we’re doing a good job linking physiology or using physiology to monitor what the impacts of climate change are, but we need to do more with behavior. So, that’s one direction in which I’d like to see climate change research move.”