December 9-10, 2010
Air Temperatures – The following maximum temperatures were recorded across the state of Hawaii Thursday afternoon:
Lihue airport, Kauai – 73
Honolulu airport, Oahu – 81
Kaneohe, Oahu – 82
Molokai airport – 81
Kahului airport, Maui – 85
Kona airport – 85
Hilo airport, Hawaii – 85
Air Temperatures ranged between these warmest and coolest spots near sea level – and on the highest mountain tops…as of 5pm Thursday evening:
Kahului, Maui – 81F
Lihue, Kauai – 73
Haleakala Crater – 39 (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea summit – 30 (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 Thursday afternoon:
2.26 Mount Waialeale, Kauai
1.75 Makaha Stream, Oahu
0.00 Molokai
0.00 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
0.00 Maui
1.93 Pahoa, Big Island
Marine Winds – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a high pressure ridge over the Hawaiian Islands. Our winds will be increasing in strength from the south to southwest into Friday.
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 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 web cam 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 web cams 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.
Tropical Cyclone activity in the eastern and central Pacific – Here’s the latest weather information coming out of the National Hurricane Center, covering the eastern north Pacific. You can find the latest tropical cyclone information for the central north Pacific (where Hawaii is located) by clicking on this link to the Central Pacific Hurricane Center. Here’s a tracking map covering both the eastern and central Pacific Ocean. A satellite image, which shows the entire ocean area between Hawaii and the Mexican coast…can be found here. Of course, as we know, our hurricane season won't end until November 31st here in the central Pacific.
Aloha Paragraphs
Locally windy and very rainy, on Kauai and Oahu ~
spreading to Maui and the Big Island on Friday
The south to southwest Kona winds will be increasing in strength…as a late autumn cold front bears down on the Hawaiian Islands. This weather map shows a 1025 millibar high pressure system far to our east-northeast, with its associated ridge hanging over the Big Island. Meanwhile, a cold front is approaching from the northwest, approaching slowing in our direction. Winds will become stronger and gusty from the south and southwest directions through Friday…as the front edges in closer. These Kona winds have become strong enough to trigger small craft wind advisories, and wind advisories in those windiest locations around the state too. Trade winds are expected to arrive back in our Hawaiian Island weather picture Sunday into early next week.
Winds will remain locally strong into Friday…the following numbers represent the strongest gusts Thursday night:
20 mph Puu Opae, Kauai
52 Makua Range, Oahu
32 Molokai
20 Kahoolawe
21 Kaupo Gap, Maui
35 Lanai Airport
17 South Point, Big Island
An area of prefrontal clouds and showers continue to roam the waters around Kauai and Oahu, bringing increasing rain…with embedded thunderstorms in the mix. A low pressure system, as shown in the weather chart above, will move quickly to our north Thursday night. As the associated cold front continues to edge towards us…rain and thunderstorms were active all day Thursday near Kauai and Oahu. This frontal boundary will prompt stronger and gusty Kona winds into Friday. This front will bring rainfall with it, some of which will be torrential…with severe thunderstorms possible through Friday. These types of heavy duty thunderstorms can bring dangerous wind conditions, lightning, along with waterspouts, and excessive rainfall.
This inclement event is taking shape as expected, which demands an extra measure of safety…for all of our Hawaiian residents and visitors. This satellite image shows the nature of this low pressure system, and its cold front, now both out to our west and northwest. Looking at this weather situation, using this tighter focus, we can see this inclement weather maker edging over and around Niihau, Kauai and Oahu…with major thunderstorms in the area at times. Shifting over to this looping radar image, we can see that heavy rainfall is streaming in towards the Kauai end of the chain, which will bring lots of water to that side of the state tonight. The other islands are still out of this wet weather field, at least so far. The expectation is that Maui County and the Big Island will see rains arriving late tonight or by Friday. Everyone in the state should be expecting heavy rains…and those gusty Kona winds too.
It's Thursday evening as I begin writing this last section of today's narrative update. The weather here in the Hawaiian Islands is turning dangerous, with severe thunderstorms in our area! The Kauai end of the island chain is taking the brunt of this activity now, which will shift to Oahu, and then down the island chain through Friday. All day Thursday the rains remained over the ocean, just to the west of Kauai, and in the Kauai Channel between Kauai and Oahu. It was just a matter of time before this stuff made its way to one of the islands! As I write this last paragraph at around 530pm, Kauai was really coming under the gun! Wind gusts to 60 mph, with copious precipitation was occurring there…and may spread to Oahu tonight. These kinds of conditions will extend into Friday, with nowhere in the Aloha state immune from this onslaught of rain and wind. So, batten down the hatches, and prepare for this inclement weather event to unfold through Friday, into Saturday. I'll be back early Friday morning with your next new weather narrative, I hope you have a good Thursday night until then! Before I go though, again, here's the looping radar image, so you can keep track of these localized heavy rains. Aloha for now…Glenn.
By the way: I was curious how many of you folks used this website on Thursday, to keep track of this December wet weather event…here in the islands. I checked, and found the number to be 22,525. For those first nine days of this month, there have been 106,074 views. Thank you so much for being a participating reader!
Interesting: The Environmental Protection Agency said on Wednesday it was again delaying its final rule on smog limits, with the rule now expected by the end of July 2011. This is the third time the agency has delayed the smog standards, originally slated to be finalized in August.
The initial standards proposed near the start of this year would limit ground-level ozone, or smog, to between 60 and 70 parts per billion measured over eight hours. The proposal was stronger than 2008 standards the Bush administration set.
Environmental groups criticized those for being less stringent than government scientists recommended. An EPA spokesman said the agency needs time to complete a scientific review.
EPA head Lisa Jackson plans to ask the agency's independent team of scientists for more guidance on studies used to make their recommendations. The proposed rules would require factories and oil, gas and power companies to cut emissions of nitrogen oxides and other chemicals called volatile organic compounds.
Smog forms when those compounds react with sunlight. Industry groups have attacked the proposed rules, arguing they have already spent billions of dollars to lower emissions. The American Petroleum Institute, the major lobbying group for oil and gas, cheered the delay.
Interesting2: Sudden changes in the volume of melt water contribute more to the acceleration — and eventual loss — of the Greenland ice sheet than the gradual increase of temperature, according to a University of British Columbia study. The ice sheet consists of layers of compressed snow and covers roughly 80 per cent of the surface of Greenland. Since the 1990s, it has been documented to be losing approximately 100 billion tonnes of ice per year — a process that most scientists agree is accelerating, but has been poorly understood.
Some of the loss has been attributed to accelerated glacier flow towards ocean outlets. Now a new study, published in the journal Nature, shows that a steady meltwater supply from gradual warming may in fact slow down glacier flow, while sudden water input could cause glaciers to speed up and spread, resulting in increased melt.
"The conventional view has been that meltwater permeates the ice from the surface and pools under the base of the ice sheet," says Christian Schoof, an assistant professor at UBC's Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences and the study's author.
"This water then serves as a lubricant between the glacier and the earth underneath it, allowing the glacier to shift to lower, warmer altitudes where more melt would occur." Noting observations that during heavy rainfall, higher water pressure is required to force drainage along the base of the ice, Schoof created computer models that account for the complex fluid dynamics occurring at the interface of glacier and bedrock.
He found that a steady supply of meltwater is well accommodated and drained through water channels that form under the glacier. "Sudden water input caused by short term extremes — such as massive rain storms or the draining of a surface lake — however, cannot easily be accommodated by existing channels.
This allows it to pool and lubricate the bottom of the glaciers and accelerate ice loss," says Schoof, who holds a Canada Research Chair in Global Process Modeling. "This certainly doesn't mitigate the issue of global warming, but it does mean that we need to expand our understanding of what's behind the massive ice loss we're worried about," says Schoof.
A steady increase of temperature and short-term extreme weather conditions have both been attributed to global climate change. According to the European Environment Agency, ice loss from the Greenland ice sheet has contributed to global sea-level rise at 0.14 to 0.28 millimeters per year between 1993 and 2003.
"This study provides an elegant solution to one of the two key ice sheet instability problems identified by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in their 2007 assessment report," says Prof.
Andrew Shepherd, an expert on using satellites to study physical processes of Earth's climate, based at the University of Leeds, the U.K. "It turns out that, contrary to popular belief, Greenland ice sheet flow might not be accelerated by increased melting after all," says Shepherd, who was not involved in the research or peer review of the paper.
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Dick Thompson Says:
Glenn, Hope you're having fun this AM!. Aloha, Dick, Kula~~~Dick, I must say that I am enjoying all this weather reporting! Aloha, Glenn