Seattle And Hawaii Battling Weird Winter Storms

Huge wave crash into Hawaii in November 2013. This weekend, waves
that make this look like a bathtub could crash ashore in Hawaii as
a very dangerous, rare storm moves in. Image via Weather Underground

It's the heart of winter storm seasons, but two places that normally aren't that wintry are, well wintry.

One of the two places I'm talking about - Hawaii - of course won't be particularly snowy, but is having some serious stormy challenged. 

The other place I'm discussing - Seattle - gets snow pretty much every winter, but the snow there lately has been much more than they're used to.

HAWAII 

It can get stormy in Hawaii, but not like they're expecting this weekend.

In the winter, Hawaii is prone to something called Kona storms.  In these cases winter storms in the North Pacific come far enough south to drag cold fronts through or near Hawaii. Ahead of these cold fronts, winds come from the southwest in Hawaii, which is opposite of the usuall east to northeast trade winds.

When the Kona storms hit, normally dry areas of Hawaii get rain. (Usually the trade winds dump rain on east facing parts of Hawaii while western parts of islands behind mountains stay dry.)  These Kona storms also increase winds, and dump snow on the highest volcanic peaks, like Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa.

The storm this weekend is odd and a lot more intense than usual because it's coming directly from the north, heading due south toward Hawaii. Which means it won't be paradise in these paradise islands this weekend.

North facing shorelines face very serious surf and coastal flooding.  Wave heights just off the northern shores of the Hawaiian islands could reach 60 feet.

The National Weather Service in Honolulu said:"Overall, this low is shaping up to be a high-impact event, bringing mulitple weather hazards and significant threats to life and property.....Anyone with vulnerablle ocean front property needs to complete their preparations for this event as soon as possible."

The NWS said the storm and waves could bring unprecedented flooding and damage to north and west facing beaches in Hawaii.

The winds, as noted will come from an unusual direction for Hawaii. That means winds could rush down the south and east slopes of some mountains, causing high, damaging winds in areas that aren't used to it, including some areas of Honolulu.

Finally, this is a cold storm so by Hawaiian standards, it's going to be frigid this weekend. High temperatures Sunday will probably only barely make it to 70 degrees Sunday amid the high winds and rains. Lows Sunday night in Honolulu will be in the upper 50s, which is ice box weather for that region.

SEATTLE SNOW

A rare, snowy mess in Sequim, along the Washington State coast.
It snows a LOT in the Cascade Mountains, but it usually rains
near the coast. Not this week.

The same complicated weather pattern in the North Pacific that's causing the Hawaii storm is setting up an unusually long-lasting spell of winter weather in the Pacific Northwest.

As of late morning today, Seattle's Sea-Tac airport had gotten 7.9 inches of snow in the latest storm. That's on top of a few inches earlier in the week. Of the snow they've gotten, 6.4 inches fell on Friday alone, the second most Seattle has gotten in a single day.

They're not used to this. Seattle usually would have gotten about 3 inches of snow for the entire season by now. 

You can tell Seattle residents don't deal with winter this intense. Grocery store shelves were pretty much devoid of break, milk water and other staples by Friday afternoon. (Despite the snow, they're being re-stocked).

Usually Seattle comes in light flurries that melt quickly.  Seattle this month so far is a snowy New-England-y landscape There was snow on the ground three days during last week, and the snow that's there now will be there for awhile.

There are daily chances of snow, or even likely periods of snow through this coming Friday around Seattle.

The snow has really been piling up in the West Coast mountains, too. Down in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, some resorts got more than seven feet of snow last week. Another several feet of accumulation is expected in the coming week.

It's going to stay cold and snowy in Seattle well into the upcoming week.

Madison Flood, Seattle Smoke and Hawaii Hurricane?

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EDITOR'S NOTE:
A photo of the Madison flood that originally appeared in this post was removed, as photo credit was not given and I could not prove it was Madison flood. I regret the error.

Spots of nasty weather keep popping up in different places in the nation. Areas around Madison, Wisconsin were inundated by up to a foot of rain, smoke is choking some areas of the west, including Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia. And Hawaii is under threat from a hurricane.

MADISON FLOOD

Around a foot of rain fell in and around Madison, Wisconsin yesterday and last night, creating some of the worst flooding some areas around there have seen in decades. 

Many roads were closed, with city officials warning people not to drive through certain sections of Madison this morning. Many people had to be rescued from stranded cars, and water flowed into a number of homes and businesses. One person has been reported missing due to the floods.

Video of the flooding is at the bottom of this post.

This was all part of a slow moving storm that also caused serious flash flooding earlier in the day around Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluffs, Iowa, among other places. Homes and apartment buildings in Council Bluffs flooded. 

The storm system also spun off a few tornadoes and caused quite a few damaging thunderstorms.

The storm will affect us here in Vermont tonight and tomorrow, but no severe thunderstorms or flooding will happen.

SMOKE ATTACK

Skyline of Seattle, Washington obscured by smoke Monday. Image form
KIRO, Seattle

Wildfires continue to rage from California to British Columbia with pretty much no relief in sight. The fires aren't only affecting people right near the fires.

Millions of people are coughing in heavy smoke settling into populated areas, including Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia.

Air quality in British Columbia over the past few days has often been the worst in the world, even worse than the epic smog attacks that sometimes engulf Beijing, China. Ironically, Beijing reported its best, cleanest air quality in a decade this past week.

All this smoke is obviously unhealthy. KIRO-TV reported the smoke in Seattle Monday was as unhealthy as smoking seven cigarettes. Authorities were warning people not to go outdoors if at all possible, and also not to bring pets outside either. Which would be difficult, I think.

In British Columbia, the smoke was so thick that flights around Vancouver were delayed, and activities at some soccer camps were postponed.

The smoke keeps making its way eastward. There have been occasional air quality alerts in places like Minnesota. Here in Vermont, we have seen periods of hazy skies occasionally over the past week due to the western smoke.

HAWAII HURRICANE?

Powerful Hurricane Lane was spinning southeast of Hawaii this morning with top sustained winds of 140 mph. Current projections indicated it could come close to, or even over some of the Hawaiian islands later this week.

Hurricane Lane could strike Hawaii later this week

It's still a bit uncertain if that will happen, but people are being told to start preparing, just in case.

Even if Hurricane Lane hits Hawaii, it will weaken a bit by the time it gets there. It would still be a powerful, dangerous storm, so  it's probably a good idea if residents start at least thinking about it.

Destructive hurricanes are rare in Hawaii but they do happen. In 1992, Hurricane Iniki hit Kauai, killing six people, injuring 1,000, destroying 1,500 homes and damaging countless other. Total estimated damages were at $1.8 billion dollars.

Here's a video of the flash flooding breaking a small retaining wall and surging into an understandably frightened woman's house:

Two Terrifying Weather Videos, But Luckily, Nobody Got Hurt

Window washers being battered by
high winds slamming their carriage
into a skyscraper.  

Two weather-related videos are making the rounds around the web this weekend, in which weather probably terrified a few people, but in the end, everyone is OK.

The first video was taken in Shanghai, China, on the 91st floor of Shanghai World Financial Centre, the second tallest building in town.

High winds came in fast, and sent a window washing carriage with two occupants swinging wildly in the gale and smashing, hard and repeatedly, against the walls of the building.

Rescue workers eventually smashed some windows on the skyscraper to reach the window washers, who were shaken up but not badly injured, says news.com.au.

The video of the window washing nightmare was taken by an office worker inside the skyscraper:


Next, we go to Seattle, Washington, where an unusually strong thunderstorm for that part of the country rolled in on Wednesday.

Cold air aloft and converging winds contributed to the storms, which dumped heavy hail in parts of the area and created lots of lightning strikes.

A person taking a video near the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport managed to catch two separate airliners getting struck by lightning.

Lightning often strikes passenger aircraft, which are designed to take such hits. But it's still briefly scary for the people in the planes, and sometimes for people watching from the ground

See for yourself: