Former Tropical Storm Lala strengthened to a hurricane on Saturday as it brought wind and rain to Hawaii.\u00a0 At 3:00 p.m. EDT on Saturday the center of Hurricane Lala was located at latitude 17.9\u00b0N and longitude 155.1\u00b0W which put the center about 85 miles (135 km) south-southeast of South Point, Hawaii.\u00a0 Lala was moving toward the west at 10 m.p.h. (16 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 75 m.p.h. (120 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 90 m.p.h. (145 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 988 mb.<\/p>\n
A Hurricane Warning is in effect for Hawaii County.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for Maui County including Maui, Lanai, Molokai, and Kahoolawe.\u00a0 <\/strong>A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for Oahu and for Kauai County including Kauai and Niihau.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Bands in the northern side of Hurricane Lala are already bringing gusty winds and rain to parts of Hawaii.<\/p>\n A weather station at Puulao on the Big Island of Hawaii reported a sustained wind speed of 46 m.p.h. (74 km\/h) and a wind gust of 69 m.p.h. (111 km\/h).\u00a0 The weather station is at an elevation of 3366 feet (1026 m).<\/p>\n The weather station at the Daniel K. Inouye Airport in Honolulu reported a wind gust of 40 m.p.h. (64 km\/h).<\/p>\n Former Tropical Storm Lala strengthened to a hurricane on Saturday.\u00a0 The inner end of a rainband wrapped around the center of Lala’s circulation.\u00a0 A circular eye was evident on satellite and radar images at the center of Hurricane Lala.\u00a0 The eye was surrounded by a broken ring of thunderstorms and the strongest winds were occurring in that broken rings of storms.\u00a0 Bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the center of Lala\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Storms near the center of Lala generated upper level divergence that pumped mass away from the hurricane.\u00a0 The removal of mass in the upper levels caused the surface pressure to decrease on Saturday.<\/p>\n The distribution of wind speeds in Hurricane Lala was still asymmetrical.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 205 miles (335 km) in the northern half of Lala\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out only 45 miles in the southern half of Hurricane Lala.<\/p>\n Hurricane Lala will move through an environment favorable for intensification during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 Lala will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperatures are near 27\u00b0C. It will move under the southern part of an upper level trough that is northeast of Hawaii.\u00a0 The upper level ridge will produce southwesterly winds that will blow toward the top of Lala\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Those winds will cause some vertical wind shear.\u00a0 The vertical wind shear will inhibit intensification, but the wind shear will not be enough to prevent intensification.\u00a0 Lala will continue to move into a region of drier air as it comes close to the Big Island of Hawaii.\u00a0 Hurricane Lala is likely to intensify to a hurricane during the next 24 hours even with the effects of the wind shear and drier air.<\/p>\n Hurricane Lala will move around the southern side of a high pressure system over the Central Pacific Ocean.\u00a0 The high pressure system will steer Lala toward the west-northwest during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 As the circulation around Tropical Storm Lala interacts with the terrain on the Big Island of Hawaii, Lala could be pulled northwest for a few hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track, the center of Hurricane Lala will come very close to the Big Island of Hawaii in a few hours.<\/p>\n Hurricane Lala could be a hurricane when the center of circulation comes near the Big Island of Hawaii. \u00a0 Lala will bring strong winds and heavy rain to the Big Island of Hawaii.\u00a0 Hurricane Lala could drop 16 to 20 inches (400 to 500 mm) of rain on the eastern slopes where the wind blows of the slope.\u00a0\u00a0 Isolated locations could receive 25 inches (635 mm) of rain.\u00a0 Heavy rain is likely to cause flash floods in some locations.<\/p>\n Hurricane Lala will also bring gusty winds and heavy rain to Maui, Lanai, Molokai, Kahoolawe, Oahu, Kauai, and Niihau.<\/p>\n Flood Watches are in effect for Hawaii County, Maui County, Oahu, and Kauai County.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Former Tropical Storm Lala strengthened to a hurricane on Saturday as it brought wind and rain to Hawaii.\u00a0 At 3:00 p.m. EDT on Saturday the center of Hurricane Lala was located at latitude 17.9\u00b0N and longitude 155.1\u00b0W which put the center about 85 miles (135 km) south-southeast of South Point, Hawaii.\u00a0 Lala was moving toward […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,2],"tags":[309,310,23,1141,1178,1185,4198,1176,1175,1177,1186,1179,4200,3291,4197],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24958"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24958"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24958\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24962,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24958\/revisions\/24962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}