June 30-July 1, 2009
Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Tuesday afternoon:
Lihue, Kauai – 82
Honolulu, Oahu – 85
Kaneohe, Oahu – 82
Kahului, Maui – 84
Hilo, Hawaii – 84
Kailua-kona – 85
Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountains…at 5 p.m. Tuesday evening:
Kailua-kona – 74F
Kahului, Maui – 63
Haleakala Crater – 43 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea summit – 43 (near 14,000 feet on the Big Island)
Precipitation Totals – The following numbers represent the largest precipitation totals (inches) during the last 24 hours on each of the major islands, as of Tuesday afternoon:
0.07 Kapahi, Kauai
0.39 Oahu Forest NWR, Oahu
0.00 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
0.17 Kula Branch Station, Maui
0.07 Honokaa, Big Island
Marine Winds – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a 1031 millibar high pressure system far to the northeast of the islands. This high pressure cell, and another very weak high far to the east, won’t be near enough to provide much more than light trade winds. These lighter than normal trade winds will remain active Wednesday and Thursday…although will be overridden by sea breezes during the days locally.
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 the state during the day and night. This next image is one that gives close images of the islands only during the daytime hours, and is referred to as a Close-up visible image. This next image shows a larger view of the Pacific…giving perspective to the wider ranging cloud patterns in the Pacific Ocean. 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 webcam on the summit of near 14,000 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. The tallest peak on the island of Maui is the Haleakala Crater, which is near 10,000 feet in elevation. These two webcams are available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon rising just after sunset for an hour or two! Plus, during the nights and early mornings you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise too…depending upon weather conditions.
Aloha Paragraphs
Fun in the summer surf…Hawaii
The forecast for lighter trade winds remains in place through Thursday…with some strengthening later Friday into the upcoming holiday weekend. The lightest point in this relaxed trade wind pattern, will likely be Wednesday into Thursday…when it will feel rather hot and humid during the days. As we move into Friday, and the 4th of July holiday weekend, these slack trade winds will pick up again gradually, helping to ventilate whatever fireworks smoke that may be around Saturday night.
Rainfall around the Hawaiian Islands will remain on the light side…gradually moving inland over the leeward slopes during the afternoon hours for a couple of days. As we move into Wednesday and Thursday, some of those afternoon showers may become a bit more generous…especially over Maui and the Big Island. The gradually strengthening trade winds Friday into this coming holiday weekend, should bring the shower activity back around to the windward sections then.
It’s Tuesday evening here in Kihei, Maui, as I begin writing this last paragraph of this morning’s narrative. Tuesday was another great day in terms of weather, with most of the showers falling over and around the mountains during the afternoon hours. Here on Maui, the slopes of the Haleakala Crater, on the leeward side, saw dark clouds gathering force during the late morning hours. As we moved into the afternoon, showers fell quite generously from about Pukalani…down through Kula to Keokea and Ulupalakua.
~~~ I’m just about ready to head out, for the drive back upcountry to Kula. As I glance out the window of my office here in Kihei, I see partly cloudy conditions, with just a little bit of blue sky showing up. Looking up slope, it’s still rather dark up there, with the afternoon clouds still hanging on. As is often the case, after sunset we typically see those cumulus clouds collapsing, making way for clear skies to begin the day on Wednesday. It wouldn’t surprise me to see a near exact repeat tomorrow, from what we saw today.
~~~ As is always the case, I’m looking forward to getting home, and on the way will enjoy listening to the evening news on National Public Radio. I’ll also enjoy viewing the different weather circumstances along the way too. When I leave Kihei, the temperature should be right around 83F or 84 degrees, dropping into the low 70’s or even high 60’s by the time I get home about 40 minutes later. I’ll be sure to come back online early Wednesday morning, when I’ll have your next weather narrative from paradise ready for viewing. I hope you have a great Tuesday night until then! Aloha for now…Glenn.
Interesting: The federal government on Monday agreed to put gray wolves in the western Great Lakes region back on the endangered species list — at least temporarily. The decision came less than two months after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service discontinued federal protection for about 4,000 wolves in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
The agency acknowledged Monday that it erred by not holding a legally required public comment period before taking action. Under a settlement with five environmental and animal protection groups that had sued the agency earlier this month, the Fish and Wildlife Service said it would return Great Lakes wolves to the list while considering its next move.
They had been classified as endangered from 1974 until their removal May 4. About 1,300 wolves in Montana and Idaho also were dropped from the list then. Because a public comment period was held in their case, they are not covered by the deal announced Monday and their status will not change. A separate lawsuit on that case will move forward.
About 300 wolves in Wyoming remain listed. U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman in Washington, D.C., must approve the settlement for it to take effect. If the Fish and Wildlife Service tries again to remove the wolves from the endangered list, it will hold a 60-day comment period, the settlement says.
The agency still believes "wolves in the western Great Lakes have met the recovery criteria and don’t need to be listed," Georgia Parham, spokeswoman for the Fish and Wildlife Service, said. Parham said federal officials had thought a comment period was not required because one had been held for a previous effort to reclassify the wolves. But they now agree another was needed, she said.
Interesting2: Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced measures on Monday to hasten the development of solar energy on Western public lands. Mr. Salazar, appearing in Las Vegas with Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, said that 670,000 acres of lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (an agency within the Department of the Interior) would be studied to determine whether they could support large solar power arrays.
Twenty-four tracts of land in six states — Nevada, Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah — are under review. Maps of the land will be published shortly in the Federal Register. The solar study zones, Mr. Salazar said, are part of the Obama administration’s push to do “everything we can to put the bulls-eye on the development of solar energy on our public lands.”
Mr. Salazar said the assessments would be done in a “thoughtful way,” to ensure not only that the sites can supply plenty of solar power, but also that they “don’t contravene the other important public values we’re trying to protect, including other environmental values.”
Solar power has run into opposition in places like California’s Mojave Desert, where environmentalists and some of their political allies fear that large solar plants could hurt fragile desert ecosystems. By the end of 2010, Mr. Salazar said, he expected there to be 13 commercial-scale solar projects under construction on public lands. “There are millions of acres set aside for oil and gas. It’s about time we did something for renewable energy,” said Mr. Reid.
Interesting3: A new line of household cleaners by Bumgartens will be sold in tablet form, requiring 75 percent less packaging and reducing the impact of shipping because the products have 85 percent less "water weight." The cleaners are part of the Conserve line, which also includes cutlery and dishware. Consumers purchase one bottle and a four-pack of tablets, and the tablets dissolve in water when ready to use.
The available products include a glass cleaner, multi-surface, bathroom and odor eliminator. By shipping cleaners without water, Conserve is able to save 7.5 pounds per bottle. By only including one bottle in a package that provides four uses, Conserve can also ship more cleaners in a single load.
Interesting4: Scientists in China are recommending that the Chinese government consider phasing out the direct burning of traditional chunks of coal in millions of households. It suggests that the government substitute coal briquettes and improved stoves for cooking and heating to help reduce the country’s high air pollution levels.
The recommendation stems from one of the first scientific studies showing that this approach is effective in improving air quality, including a 98 percent reduction in air pollution from tiny, inhalable particles of coal soot. In the new study, Yingjun Chen and colleagues note that government officials have said for years that coal briquettes and improved stoves with better ventilation may cut emissions, but few scientific studies have tested this claim.
Millions of homes in rural China and other parts of the world burn raw coal chunks in small, low-efficiency stoves for cooking and heating. Studies indicate that emissions from incomplete coal combustion in these stoves contribute significantly to China’s serious air pollution levels — among the highest in the world.
Interesting5: The H1N1 flu, also known as the swine flu, is proving more virulent than had previously been thought, French Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot was quoted as saying Monday. "Summer is usually less favorable for the contamination by the virus but, contrary to what we had hoped, we are not registering a summer pause" in the spread of the disease, Bachelot told the daily Le Parisien.
Bachelot said it was possible that summer actually aided the spread of the virus because people traveled more and were more sociable. She said that France would triple the number of hospitals, to more than 300, equipped to take charge of H1N1 flu cases.
France currently counted 276 confirmed cases of the illness, and another 258 people showing symptoms of the disease were being investigated. At the weekend, eight schools were shut in France after pupils fell ill because of the H1N1 flu.
Interesting6: Dust in the wind is rewriting the cycle of life in the mountains. Throughout memory the warmth of spring has begun the mountain snowmelt, bringing life-giving water to greening plants so they can blossom and renew their species. But now, scientists say, the timing is being thrown off by desert dust stirred as global warming dries larger areas and human activity increases in those regions.
This dust darkens the surface of winter snows, warming it by absorbing sunlight that the white surface would have reflected. That causes the snow to melt earlier than in the past, running off before the air has warmed enough to spur plant growth, researchers report in Tuesday’s edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"It is striking how different the landscape looks as result of this desert-mountain interaction," Chris Landry, director of the Center for Snow and Avalanche Studies in Silverton, Colo. and a co-author of the report, said in a statement. The researchers established test plots in the San Juan Mountains in Colorado. Some plots were left alone to collect snow and dust naturally, others had extra dust added and a third group had naturally arriving dust removed.
Interesting7: Particulate pollution thought to be holding climate change in check by reflecting sunlight instead enhances warming when combined with airborne soot, a new study has found. Like a black car on a bright summer day, soot absorbs solar energy. Recent atmospheric models have ranked soot, also called black carbon, second only to carbon dioxide in potential for atmospheric warming.
But particles, or aerosols, such as soot mix with other chemicals in the atmosphere, complicating estimates of their role in changing climate. "Until now, scientists have had to assume how soot is mixed with other chemical species in individual particles and estimate how that ultimately impacts their warming potential," said Kimberly Prather, professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego.
"Our measurements show that soot is most commonly mixed with other chemicals such as sulfate and this mixing happens very quickly in the atmosphere. These are the first direct measurements of the optical properties of atmospheric soot and allow us to better understand the role of soot in climate change."
Interesting8: The first month of the Atlantic hurricane season ended with a whimper Tuesday: No named tropical storms or hurricanes formed in June. However, that’s not unusual, as the average date of the first named storm doesn’t occur until July 10, according to Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
Feltgen also reports that the average date of the first Atlantic hurricane is Aug. 14. Since the naming of storms began in 1953, the latest an Atlantic storm has formed was Anita on Aug. 29, 1977. On average, based on records that go back to 1851, a tropical storm forms every other June in the Atlantic basin, which also encompasses the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea.
The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration predicted in May that there would be nine to 14 named storms in the Atlantic this year, of which four to seven could become hurricanes, including one to three major hurricanes (Category 3, 4 or 5).
A quiet June doesn’t necessarily presage a quiet remainder to the season, reminds Feltgen. In 2004, a year that had 15 named storms — including Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne — the first storm didn’t form until July 31. In the eastern Pacific basin, Hurricane Andres was the only named storm to form in June. It grazed the west coast of Mexico on June 22, killing one person. No storms or hurricanes are forecast to form in either the Atlantic or Pacific basins for at least the next two days, reports the center.
Interesting9: Threats to sharks are nothing new. For years, scientists have been saying that these ancient fish are in danger of going extinct as many are caught by accident, or on purpose just for their fins, and populations are decimated. Now a new warning from the International Union for Conservation of Nature states that nearly a third of sharks and rays are threatened with extinction.
The analysis of 64 species of ocean sharks and rays found 32 percent are at risk, including the great white shark. An estimated 38 million sharks are killed for their fins each year. Sharks, meanwhile, kill very few people (despite the myth that they’re very deadly). If sharks go, the ocean food chain could crumble, experts have warned.
Top predators are key to keeping populations of key species from growing too large. If sharks die off, you could have a food chain Whac-a-Mole, scientists say. At least one exception to the dire situation: The biggest sharks of all, whale sharks, are thriving off the coast of western Australia.
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