November 17-18 2008


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

Port Allen, Kauai – 77
Honolulu, Oahu – 82
Kaneohe, Oahu – 79
Kahului, Maui – 83
Hilo, Hawaii – 81
Kailua-kona – 84

Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level, and on the highest mountains…at 4 p.m. Monday afternoon:

Kailua-kona – 81F  
Lihue, Kauai – 70 

Haleakala Crater    – 48  (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea summit – 36  (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 Monday afternoon:

8.27 Mount Waialaele, Kauai
3.24 Oahu Forest NWR, Oahu
0.01 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.01 Kahoolawe
0.20 West Wailuaiki, Maui
0.82 Mountain View, Big Island

Weather Chart – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a high pressure system far northwest of the state, which will produce locally strong trade winds today. Wind speeds will diminish tonight and Wednesday as the high moves east and weakens. Low pressure developing far to the northwest will move closer to the state, turning winds to the southeast and south toward the end of the week.

Satellite and Radar Images: To view the cloud conditions we have here in Hawaii, please use the following satellite links, starting off with the 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. 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

      

 http://www.randyjaybraun.com/images/AaikaHula.jpg
Windy Hula dancing on the beach
Photo Credit: Randy Jay Braun


 

A relatively close, and fairly strong 1033 millibar high pressure system has moved into the area north-northwest of the islands, with strong and gusty trade winds buffeting our area for the next couple of days. These strong trade wind gusts, topping-out at just below 40 mph Monday evening, have been noted in a few of the windiest spots. The blustery trade winds have extended down through the entire island chain now, and will continue through Tuesday. Winds will slack-off starting Wednesday, and should get considerably lighter through the second half of the week…perhaps coming up from the south to southeast then. Anytime we start talking about southeast winds, of course there is that chance of more volcanic haze spreading up through the island chain.

All of this trade wind action has carried lots of moisture onto the windward sides of the islands, at least on Kauai and parts of Oahu thus far. Copious amounts of moisture have fallen over Kauai, where an impressive 8.27" of the wet stuff has fallen over the mountains there during the last 24 hours! The coastal windward sides will continue to feel this dampness, across all the islands for the next few days…although it hadn’t reached Maui and the Big Island quite yet. Some of these showers may be carried over into the leeward sides at times too. An upper level low pressure system moving by through Tuesday, will keep enhanced rainfall in the forecast. Some heavy showers may be triggered over the leeward upcountry areas during the afternoons…with even a thunderstorm erupting at times here and there.   

As we move through the rest of the week, we should continue to see off and on showers…some of which will continue to be locally heavy. The beginning of this off and on wet spell will be provided by the leftover moisture from the recently dissipated cold front. The computer models continue to have some difficulty nailing-down exactly what will be coming our way during the second half of the week. The winds will come down though, that’s clear, and probably come up from the deeper tropics. This suggests that afternoon clouds will increase, with the chance of locally heavy showers Friday into the weekend. The latest GFS model run shows a low pressure system dipping down over or near the Hawaiian Islands later in the week…which will bring another potential spell of wet weather with it.

The main thing will be the continued threat of locally heavy showers, carried our way on the stronger than normal trade winds. The combination of the strong trade winds, the available moisture riding in on these gusty trade winds, and the instability caused by the upper low… are setting the stage for this locally wet weather. This looping radar image will show you where the heaviest rains are falling. As this new week starts, the islands of Maui County and the Big Island aren’t seeing so much of the rainfall yet, but it will arrive with time. The latest satellite image shows that the most generous rainfall is concentrated most around Oahu at the time of this writing. ~~~ Meanwhile, all the gusty trade wind action has started a small craft wind advisory from Kauai down through Maui, while at the same time we find a high surf advisory for the Kauai through Oahu east coasts. ~~~ Looking out the window here in Kihei, Maui, before I take the drive back home to Kula, I see considerable amounts of thick high cirrus clouds. At the same time, there are thickening lower level cumulus clouds too, suggest that showers may finally be moving into the islands of Maui County soon? If anything unusual happens between here and home, I’ll come back online and let you know. Otherwise, I will be back very early Tuesday morning with your next new weather narrative from paradise! I hope you have a great Monday night until then. Aloha for now…Glenn.

Interesting:















Will the world’s economic melt down stall initiatives to curb global warming? World leaders in the campaign to address climate change will confront that question as they gather in Beverly Hills tomorrow and Wednesday to shape policies aimed at responding to the mounting threats to food production, public health and the environment. “The goal is very simple: to form a broad international alliance,” Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said when he called for the summit, the first of its kind in the United States. The lineup includes high-ranking government officials from Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico and the United States. Among the attendees will be governors, directors of environmental programs, business executives and environmentalists. The United Nations is sending one of its top climate change officials. “This summit brings together leaders who are in the true hot spots around the world,” said Carter Roberts, president of the World Wildlife Fund.

Interesting2:



The main ship in Japan’s whaling fleet set out for the Antarctic on Monday for its first hunt in the region since limping home with just over half its planned catch in April following clashes with militant anti-whaling activists, environmentalist group Greenpeace said. The Nisshin Maru set out from Innoshima in western Japan, Greenpeace said, part of a plan to take about 850 minke whales and 50 fin whales. Last year six ships took part in the hunt. The vessel’s movements will be followed by a ship belonging to Sea Shepherd, an anti-whaling group that skirmished repeatedly with the fleet at sea last year in an attempt to halt the hunt. Earlier on Monday, Australia urged Japan to abandon its yearly hunt, launching its own scientific whaling study in the Southern Ocean to prove it was not necessary to kill the ocean mammals to study them. "Modern-day research uses genetic and molecular techniques as well as satellite tags, acoustic methods and aerial surveys rather than grenade-tipped harpoons," Australian Environment Minister Peter Garrett told reporters in Canberra.

Australia does not believe that we need to kill to understand them, Garrett said. A Japanese Fisheries Agency official last week denied a newspaper report that Tokyo would cut by 20 percent the number of whales it planned to hunt due to anti-whaling protests. But the official said that a moratorium on catching would stay in place. "Waved off only by the crew’s families and whaling officials, the factory ship Nisshin Maru left Innoshima with no fanfare," Greenpeace said in a statement. "Constant pressure on Japan’s whaling industry by both Greenpeace and the international community has reduced the fleet to sneaking out of port in a fog of crisis and scandal, desperate to avoid attention, the statement quoted Sara Holden, Greenpeace International Whales Coordinator, as saying. Japanese whaling officials declined to confirm the ship’s departure, citing safety considerations, but a worker at a local hotel said about 10 people connected with the the Institute of Cetacean Research and whalers’ families had stayed overnight.

Interesting3:



California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Friday ordered preparations for rising sea levels from global warming., a startling prospect for the most populous U.S. state with a Pacific Ocean coastline stretching more than 800 miles. Recorded sea levels rose 7 inches during the 20th century in San Francisco, Schwarzenegger said in the executive order for study of how much more the sea could rise, what other consequences of global warming were coming and how the state should react. California is considered the environmental vanguard of government in the United States, with its own standards for car pollution and a law to cut emissions of carbon dioxide, the main gas contributing to global warming. "The longer that California delays planning and adapting to sea level rise the more expensive and difficult adaptation will be," Schwarzenegger said, ordering a report by the end of 2010.

Interesting4:



It is an image worthy of a Keats poem or a Constable landscape: great orchards bursting with fruit, fields crammed with ripening vegetables and hillsides covered with sheep and cattle. But this is no dream of long-gone rural glories. It is a vision of the kind of countryside that Britain may need if it is to survive the impact of climate change and higher oil prices, according to leading agricultural experts. They have warned that only a total revolution in the nation’s food industry can save Britain from serious shortages of staples as world oil production peaks, the climate continues to heat up, the population grows and our dietary needs continue to evolve. In turn that means a complete shake-up in the way we farm the countryside. At present Britain imports more than 90 per cent of the fruit it consumes. ‘We face some awesome changes in the way we deal with food production,’ said Tim Lang, professor of food policy at CityUniversity, London. ‘For the past century we have relied on oil to produce more and more food for ourselves – mainly through the use of petroleum products to make cheap fertilizers.’

Interesting5:



What’s the healthiest city in America? It appears to be Burlington, Vt. Vermont‘s largest city is tops among U.S. metropolitan areas by having the largest proportion of people — 92 percent — who say they are in good or great health.  It’s also among the best in exercise and among the lowest in obesity, diabetes and other measures of ill health, according to a recent report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This New England city of 40,000, on the shores of Lake Champlain, is in some ways similar to the unhealthiest city — Huntington, W.Va. Both are out-of-the-way college towns with populations that are overwhelmingly white people of English, German or Irish ancestry. But there the similarities end:
































—Burlington is younger, with an average age of 37, compared to 40 in Huntington, according to the Census Bureau.

—Burlington is better off financially, with 8 percent living at the federal poverty level, compared to 19 percent in Huntington.

—It’s much more educated, with nearly 40 percent of area residents having at least a college bachelor’s degree. Only 15 percent in the Huntington area do.

The cultures are significantly different, too. Bicycling, hiking, skiing and other exercises are common in Burlington. Neighborhood groups commonly focus on improving parks, working in community gardens and repairing and improving sidewalks. "There’s this norm of a lot of activity," said Chris Finley, Vermont‘s deputy health commissioner, who works in Burlington. And though college staples like pizza are common, healthier foods are also popular. Grass-fed beef is offered in finer restaurants, vegan options are plentiful, and the lone downtown supermarket is run by a co-op successful in selling bulk rice and other healthy choices to low-income residents. Burlington is helped by the presence of IBM and other employers offering more generous health benefits and corporate wellness programs than companies in Huntington, some experts suggested.

 
























can also spoil the milk, making it taste bitter and turn thick and sticky. Now scientists have discovered new species of bacteria that can grow at low temperatures, spoiling raw milk even when it is refrigerated. According to research published in the November issue of the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology, the microbial population of raw milk is much more complex than previously thought. "When we looked at the bacteria living in raw milk, we found that many of them had not been identified before," said Dr Malka Halpern from the University of Haifa, Israel. "We have now identified and described one of these bacteria, Chryseobacterium oranimense, which can grow at cold temperatures and secretes enzymes that have the potential to spoil milk."  New technologies are being developed to reduce the initial bacterial counts of pasteurized milk to very low levels.

Most enzymes will be denatured at the high temperatures used during pasteurisation, which means they will stop working. However, the heat-stable enzymes made by cold-tolerant bacteria will still affect the flavour quality of fluid milk and its products. Because of this, research into cold-tolerant bacteria and the spoilage enzymes they produce is vital. "Milk can be contaminated with many different bacteria from the teat of the cow, the udder, milking equipment and the milking environment," said Dr Halpern. "Milk is refrigerated after collection to limit the growth of microbes. During refrigeration, cold-tolerant, or psychrotolerant, bacteria that can grow at 7°C dominate the milk flora and play a leading role in milk spoilage. Although we have not yet determined the impact on milk quality of C. oranimense and two other novel species (C. haifense and C. bovis) that were also identified from raw milk samples, the discovery will contribute to our understanding the physiology of these organisms and of the complex environmental processes in which they are involved. There is still a lot to learn about the psychrotolerant bacterial flora of raw milk."



can also spoil the milk, making it taste bitter and turn thick and sticky. Now scientists have discovered new species of bacteria that can grow at low temperatures, spoiling raw milk even when it is refrigerated. According to research published in the November issue of the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology, the microbial population of raw milk is much more complex than previously thought. "When we looked at the bacteria living in raw milk, we found that many of them had not been identified before," said Dr Malka Halpern from the University of Haifa, Israel. "We have now identified and described one of these bacteria, Chryseobacterium oranimense, which can grow at cold temperatures and secretes enzymes that have the potential to spoil milk."  New technologies are being developed to reduce the initial bacterial counts of pasteurized milk to very low levels.

Most enzymes will be denatured at the high temperatures used during pasteurisation, which means they will stop working. However, the heat-stable enzymes made by cold-tolerant bacteria will still affect the flavour quality of fluid milk and its products. Because of this, research into cold-tolerant bacteria and the spoilage enzymes they produce is vital. "Milk can be contaminated with many different bacteria from the teat of the cow, the udder, milking equipment and the milking environment," said Dr Halpern. "Milk is refrigerated after collection to limit the growth of microbes. During refrigeration, cold-tolerant, or psychrotolerant, bacteria that can grow at 7°C dominate the milk flora and play a leading role in milk spoilage. Although we have not yet determined the impact on milk quality of C. oranimense and two other novel species (C. haifense and C. bovis) that were also identified from raw milk samples, the discovery will contribute to our understanding the physiology of these organisms and of the complex environmental processes in which they are involved. There is still a lot to learn about the psychrotolerant bacterial flora of raw milk."