Hawaiian Islands weather details & Aloha paragraphs / November 24-25, 2008

November 24-25 2008

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

Lihue, Kauai – 79
Honolulu, Oahu – 83
Kaneohe, Oahu – 80
Kahului, Maui – 82
Hilo, Hawaii – 81
Kailua-kona – 83

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

Barking Sands, Kauai – 82F
Molokai airport – 77F

Haleakala Crater    – 47  (near 10,000 feet on Maui)
Mauna Kea summit – 34  (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:

0.56 Mount Waialaele, Kauai
0.40 Oahu Forest NWR, Oahu
0.00 Molokai
0.01 Lanai
0.00 Kahoolawe
0.07 Hana airport, Maui
0.30 Pahoa, Big Island

Weather Chart – Here’s the latest (automatically updated) weather map showing a surface high far northeast of the islands will be nearly stationary through Thursday. As a cold front approaches from the northwest on Thursday, the high will move quickly northeast, and winds will veer to the south. The front will reach Kauai late Friday, and dissipate as it stalls near the central islands on Saturday. Fresh and cool north to northeast winds will briefly follow the front.

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

      

 
  Great beach weather, with gusty winds
Photo Credit: Flikr.com

The trade winds blew strongly during the day Monday…topping out near 50 mph in those windiest areas! These gusty winds are strong enough now that a small craft wind advisory flag remains active across much of the entire state. The strongest winds of this windy episode are expected across the highest elevations of Maui and the Big Island, where a wind advisory is now in force. The computer models suggest that lighter southeast to south winds will return later on Thanksgiving evening, ahead of a cold front scheduled to arrive on Kauai by Friday night, moving down into the chain a distance on Saturday. Our winds may turn cooler from the north and northeast following the frontal passage.

Island skies will remain quite sunny, especially along the leeward beaches…with areas of high clouds. The gusty trade winds will carry just a few clouds to the windward sides, but the air mass is quite dry…which will limit the amount of showers greatly. This dry reality will stick with us through the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday. Thereafter, we should find some changes, as a cold front arrives Friday into Saturday. This late autumn frontal system will bring showers to the islands as it passes down into the state a distance. Drier weather will return after the cold front, although the windward sides may find drizzle or mist falling for a day or so.

It’s early Monday evening here in Kula, Maui, as I begin writing this last paragraph. Monday was one of those days really nice late autumn days, as long as you didn’t mind being buffeted by the gusty trade winds. These trades weren’t felt everywhere, as the winds were coming in at such a direct easterly dirction. This helps put some part of the state in relatively light to moderately strong winds only. Here in Kihei, where I spent the day working at the Pacific Disaster Center, there were light winds in general. This made for an exceptionally nice day to go beaching. In contrast, there were those wind exposed areas that had wind whipping around at near 50 mph in contrast! The winds will remain blustery Tuesday, although once again continue blowing from the east direction. These gusty winds will ease up a bit on Wednesday, and then further on Thursday, ahead of an approaching cold front to the northwest. ~~~ I’ll be back very early Tuesday morning with your next new weather narrative from paradise. I see very little that will be different however then, with lots of sunshine, and dry weather almost everywhere. I hope you have a great Monday night wherever you happen to be spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Interesting: A week of incessant rains in the northern Philippines has left at least six people dead and flooded over 200 farming villages. Swollen rivers burst their banks causing extensive damage to property and crops. At least 10,000 people have fled to evacuation centres on higher ground, but the distribution of relief materials is being hampered as several major roads and bridges remain underwater and impassable. The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) issued flood advisories across central and northern Luzon and a state of calamity was declared in the provinces of Isabela and Carayan.

The heavy rains began last Monday, sparked by an active cold front embedded within the Inter-tropical convergence zone (ITCZ). The ITCZ is a belt of low pressure around the Earth, formed due to large scale ascent of air where trade winds from the north and south meet near the equator. The position of the ITCZ varies depending on the time of year, resulting in the wet and dry seasons of the tropics. The Philippines are prone to flooding, many are blaming the recent severe floods on illegal logging. Extensive removal of large areas of trees can lead to increased run-off and silting in major rivers, exacerbating the flooding in low-lying areas.

Interesting2: 

The Southern Ocean has proved more resilient to global warming than previously thought and remains a major store of mankind’s planet-warming carbon dioxide, a study has found. Oceans absorb a large portion of the extra CO2 released by mankind through burning fossil fuels or deforestation, acting as a brake on climate change, and the Southern Ocean is the largest of these "carbon sinks."  Previous research has suggested the vast ocean between Australia and Antarctica was losing its potency because climate change had affected its currents and increased powerful westerly winds. The latest study compares ship-based measurements of the ocean since the 1960s and more recent data from hundreds of robotic floats. The analysis shows the Southern Ocean has maintained its ability to soak up excess carbon despite changes to currents and wind speeds.

"It’s a positive thing. It’s one thing it looks like we don’t have to worry about as much as we thought," said Steve Rintoul of the Center for Australian Weather and Climate Research, part of a team researchers that also included scientists from the Institute for Marine Research at the University of Kiel in Germany. Rintoul said the data showed, as had earlier studies, the Southern Ocean was becoming warmer, and also fresher. The study was published this week in Nature. He said with data on salinity and temperature, the team could measure density of sea water and how that density changed from one place to another in relation to how fast water was moving between two places. "By looking at the density we could say something about the way the major currents were or were not changing. "And this was the surprise. We found that the currents had not changed. They had shifted their position, they’d shifted closer to Antarctica but not become stronger or weaker.

Interesting3: 

In “Dover Beach,” the 19th Century poet Matthew Arnold describes waves that “begin, and cease, and then again begin…and bring the eternal note of sadness in.”  But in the warming world of the 21st Century, waves could be riding oceans that will rise anywhere from 19 inches to 55 inches, and researchers believe there’s a good chance they will stir stronger feelings than melancholia. Several scientists from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego are finding that sea level rise will have different consequences in different places but that they will be profound on virtually all coastlines. Land in some areas of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of the United States will simply be underwater. On the West Coast, with its different topography and different climate regimes, problems will likely play out differently.

The scientists’ most recent conclusions, even when conservative scenarios are involved, suggest that coastal development, popular beaches, vital estuaries, and even California’s supply of fresh water could be severely impacted by a combination of natural and human-made forces. Scripps climate scientists often consider changes in average conditions over many years but, in this case, it’s the extremes that have them worried. A global sea level rise that makes gentle summer surf lap at a beachgoer’s knees rather than his or her ankles is one thing. But when coupled with energetic winter El Niño-fueled storms and high tides, elevated water levels would have dramatic consequences. The result could transform the appearance of the beaches at the heart of California allure. As sea level goes up, some beaches are going to shrink, said Scripps oceanographer Peter Bromirski.

Interesting4: 

Rich nations should make the first cuts in greenhouse gases while developing countries carry on business-as-usual for the time being, according to a report published on Monday by HarvardUniversity. This is among proposals by the American university’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs to negotiators who meet for U.N. climate talks next week in Poland. The current climate pact, the Kyoto Protocol, expires in 2012 and governments are scrambling to agree a new treaty by the end of next year. "The new agreement should be scientifically sound, economically rational and politically pragmatic," Professor Robert Stavins of the Harvard Project on International Climate Agreements said. The Harvard report calls on rich nations to lead in cutting emissions, while developing countries can "maintain their business-as-usual emissions in the first decades, but over the longer term agree to binding targets that ultimately reduce emissions below business as usual.

Interesting5:

Carbon dioxide, a potential fingerprint of life, has been discovered for the first time in the atmosphere of a planet orbiting another star. However, the planet, HD 189733b, is too hot to be habitable. But the discovery nonetheless has scientists excited, because carbon dioxide is one of four chemicals that life can generate, so being able to detect it shows that astronomers have the ability to find the signs of life on other worlds. "This is the first detection of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of an extra-solar planet, which means that three of the Big Four biomarkers for habitable/inhabited worlds have now been seen: water, methane, and now carbon dioxide," explained Alan Boss, a planet-formation theorist at the Carnegie Institution of Washington who was not involved in the finding. "The only one that has not yet been detected is oxygen/ozone." Boss told SPACE.com that the detections provide "proof of concept" for what astronomers would search for in looking at an Earth-like world. The detection of carbon dioxide, Boss said, was made with a low degree of resolving power, the sort that could be provided by NASA’s planned Terrestrial Planet Finder. HD 189733b is about 65 light-years away. It is a giant, gaseous world known as a "hot Jupiter" because it orbits very close to its host star.

Interesting6:

The Grand Canyon seems to be fixed in time, but it is hardly permanent, and lately, neither are geologists’ estimates for its age, sparking what one scientist calls "the Grand Canyon Wars."  While a recent study in the journal Science suggested that the Grand Canyon was about 16 million to 17 million years old (much older than previously thought), a new study, detailed in the journal Geology, argues that geological evidence still supports the long-standing age of 6 million years. The new study also proposes that the carving of the canyon’s iconic burnt-orange walls by the Colorado River was triggered by tectonic uplift. The Science study had dated mineral deposits in cave formations in one layer of the Grand Canyon. The deposits, called mammillaries, form when the mineral calcium carbonate precipitates out of the water and deposits on the existing rock walls.

These formations, also called speleothems, form when the water table is at the level of the caves, and so give a record of when the river cut past that particular layer of rock, said co-author of the Science study Carol Hill, of the University of New Mexico. Hill and her colleagues used the dates to propose that an earlier river had begun to carve out the western end of the Grand Canyon around 16 million to 17 million years ago. Around 6 million years ago, the eastern and western portions of the Grand Canyon connected, allowing the Colorado to flow all the way through, eventually carving out the 277-mile (446-kilometer) long and 1-mile (1.6-kilometer) deep canyon which exists today. The study created a stir amongst geologists who study the Grand Canyon and spurred what Hill calls "the Grand Canyon Wars," with other geologists writing in responses to their paper and submitting studies of their own, one being the new Geology study.

Interesting7:

At the Automotive News Green Car Conference, aluminum was deemed a cost-effective solution to future automotive development, especially in key areas such as fuel economy, reduced emissions, high recyclability and improved safety. Dr. Rick Winter, director of development, AlcoaTechnologyCenter, said North American automotive aluminum content has more than tripled in the last three decades because of its “environmental, safety and driving performance” advantages. "Since 1990, increased use of aluminum in the world’s vehicles has avoided burning 84 billion liters of gasoline and more than one billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions," said Winter. "In fact, it is projected that the growing use of aluminum in the transportation market will help make the aluminum industry greenhouse gas neutral by 2025."

Recycling scrap aluminum requires only five percent of the energy required to make new aluminum from virgin materials. Because of its significantly lighter weight, each pound of aluminum that replaces two pounds of iron or steel in a car can save a net 20 pounds of CO₂ emissions over the vehicle’s lifetime – even allowing for the CO₂ generated by the by the initial production of aluminum. Alcoa has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 33 percent since 1990. The company is also a founding member of the United States Climate Action Partnership and the Global Roundtable on Climate Change.