 This is Stink Tech, Hawaii. Community matters here. Bingo, we're back. This is Jay Fidel with research at Minoa. I'm wearing my hat and my cat's a delicatessen hat because it's raining so hard. And my umbrella broke when I took my morning walk today and I got so wet, I couldn't believe it. It was so wet in my neighborhood and the water was raging down the street. It was awful. In fact, it cut our walk short. That's Dennis Juan. Dennis is with the faculty at UHC Grant College program, which is affiliated with NOAA. So you're a Fed, aren't you? Yeah. Today we're going to take stock. It couldn't be a more appropriate take stock of what's going on with our current Olivia, but also we also want to connect up and see what does Olivia have to do with Florence on the East Coast and with all the other hurricanes that are going on in the world. So we're going to divide the show in two parts. One is we're going to take a status report on what's happening outside and the other is we're going to connect up a sort of global connection of all these hurricanes and climate change. Welcome again to the show, Dennis. Thank you, Jay. It's good to be back. It's appropriate time. There's a lot of activity going on right now. A lot of things to learn from what's going on. Yeah, isn't that true? Yeah. It's like you always want to learn from every calamity and for that matter, every extreme storm so we can do better the next time. That's right. And today we're going to have some pictures for Florence, Aniki, Lane and Olivia. We'll cover all of those. We'll show you some relationships that I think may be important for your listeners or viewers and a lot of things to go over. Okay. Well first you have some pictures and by those pictures we can take a closer look at what's going on with Olivia right now in Hawaii. So take it away, Dennis. Okay. So actually why don't we go to the first picture then and we're actually going to go to Florence because this is a typical graph from the National Weather Service. They'll produce this on the east coast for the systems there and also in Hawaii for the Pacific and it's very important that your readers know how to understand this graph. Okay. So that white cone is your cone of uncertainty. Okay. So a lot of people have been exposed to that. They may not realize that that cone supposed to represent 67% accuracy. So where that X is, this is by the way Hurricane Florence and it was just taken a few hours ago for the National Weather Service report in the Atlantic and where that X is where the center of the hurricane is and that cone represents the cone of uncertainty with a 67% accuracy. That means that there's still a 30% or 33% chance that the eye could go outside of that cone anywhere along that cone. And then the other thing to note is the dark brown is where the extent of the hurricane force winds, it's a very large system Florence. It's right now it's a category 320 mile per hour sustained winds and the diameter for the light brown circle is over several hundred miles in diameter and what's important that you note is even if the eye goes in the cone or outside of the cone, the extent of the hurricane force winds and the tropical storm winds are going to go way outside of that. So for instance, say the eye goes, makes landfall near the northern part of the cone, the hurricane winds and the tropical storm winds could affect Virginia or further north. And if the eye were to go along the southern border of that cone, the tropical storm winds could affect Georgia or Florida. So it's very important to understand what that cone represents and also realize that this is a relatively new product. National Weather Service has started doing this. The cone of uncertainty. The cone of uncertainty combined with the wind fields. The wind fields are the the the brown blob, dark brown blob and the lighter blob which represent hurricane force winds and tropical storm force winds. So it's very important to realize that you could get impacts outside of the cone. Very important to always follow National Weather Service. Where is the M? There was these black dots. What is that? The M stands for major hurricane. Okay, so when it and then when it it's category three, four or five, one or two is hurricane and then you'll see sometimes it'll convert to an S where it means it's a tropical storm. Okay, you can learn a lot from that. Yes, it's important because a lot of people think I'm outside of the cone. I don't need to worry but that's not the case and they need to have always always listen to TV and radio always you know listen for the updates and usually the National Weather Service has six hour updates. 5 a.m. 11 a.m. 5 p.m. 11 p.m. Okay, so you should be watching the cone but it needs to have these reports because it changes. Right, it's going to change. Outside of the cone are you safe? No, you're still there still could be risk involved. You know, it's better to be outside of the cone than inside the cone but you still need to have be alert and won't monitor what's going on. Okay. You said this was a category three. Yes, off of the Carolinas and it's you said it was 120 sustained. 120 mile per hour sustained. That's pretty serious. If that came ashore in Hawaii that would do a lot of damage, wouldn't it? Yes, well actually maybe we should go to the next slide because we'll show exactly what could happen. Yeah, let's do that. Okay, so why don't we go to the next slide. Okay, so this is a Niki making a landfall on Kauai as a category four hurricane. It actually at the time it had 120 mile per hour sustained winds just like Florence now but the winds were amplified because it was moving so far, moving forward so fast like the forward movement like 20 miles per hour at it to 120 miles per hour rotational speed gave you the 140 mile per hour wind speed when it made landfall. So it was actually a category three or four when Niki made landfall. But the key thing to note is if Niki had turned north six hours earlier instead of impacting Kauai would have hit Oahu and instead of damaging six or seven thousand structures it could have damaged 50,000 structures or damaged or destroyed 50,000 structures. That's confirmed in a risk assessment. A lot of people do not realize how vulnerable Oahu is and when we saw this information actually this is really one of the main reasons that spurred us to do the homeowners handbook because realize there's so many people that are vulnerable and they don't really understand the risk that's involved and all the different ways they could do to try and protect themselves. So this is very instructive about what could happen. So you say vulnerable, what do you mean by vulnerable? Certainly there's going to be a multiple of ten times as many structures both office structures and residential structures like Oahu as in say Kauai. Is that what you mean by vulnerable or is it infrastructure where some of those structures actually are providing infrastructure to the community and if you break them then all the structures become you know deprived. Yeah well it's both I mean because we're talking primarily about structures here like houses and buildings but the infrastructure is going to be impacted also and by vulnerable we mean that it's exposed so it's exposed to the storm surge the rain and the wind okay not only it is exposed but there it's sensitive to these impacts because like some of the buildings are old you know so they won't withstand very withstand the forces very well that's what we mean by vulnerable there's exposure there's sensitivity to these potential impacts and you know it's that's really the worst case almost the worst case scenario. Is it fair to say that a more densely populated area is always more vulnerable than a less densely populated area? Yes because they have more exposure yeah it's the number of structures that are essentially Oahu has eight times more structures than Kauai so if you have six or seven thousand houses damaged or destroyed on Kauai multiply that by eight that's where we get roughly the fifty thousand that and then there's still other things like impact infrastructure power lines roads trees you know other things for that matter yeah services that supply the neighbor islands right so if you have damage to centralized services of any kind in Oahu that's going to have a secondary effect on neighbor islands right yeah so let's see some more of your pictures okay so can we get the next picture okay so this is Lane and really we had three systems we do a lot of outreach in throughout the state over the last years and the people that we find the most difficult to reach are on Oahu it's not be it's not related to like the how the county agencies are formed that the emergency management structure or anything like we think it's related more like just the fact that people on Oahu are more urbanized in a way they think more about business maybe they're less in tune with nature but they seem to be the least prepared and or take preparation the most likely so here's Lane and here's it's you see and it's a major category hurricane this is just as strong as Florence is right now at this point in time and it's start it's it has a projection to curve and threaten the Hawaiian islands and especially Oahu okay now if it were not for this shear remember the system got sheared off yeah and then the trade winds pushed the bottom of the hurricane to the west okay but that's what happened but potentially if there was no shear the system would have continued north as a pretty strong hurricane threatening Oahu and the other islands so here you have like two scenarios that happen one is what actually happened which Lane was a non-event for a lot of people on Oahu and they may say oh there's not going to be any impact there's no need to prepare the other scenario is something similar to a Niki where the system curves north and hits Oahu as a major as a strong hurricane and tens of thousands of structures are damaged and all of a sudden people something like this could happen in a matter of a day or two you know depending on the scenario people be caught off surprise that's why people really got to understand the risk there is risk out there and they really got to be proactive about preparing they just can't prepare for Lane or Olivia they need to all their preparations need to be for the short term but extrapolated into the long term so that so that it it goes into 2019 for instance and I'll explain what's we'll explain shortly about that why that's important yeah okay all right are we ready for our break then Dennis sure you want to take another picture we can sure let's take another picture okay well and here is here's Olivia this was taken just a few hours ago released from the National Weather Service and again you see the cone of uncertainty the the center of the tropical storm is over Maui now it's already made landfall on Maui and Lanai and here's where here's why it's important to see the wind field do you see the light brown circle yeah wind field that shows that even though Oahu looks like it's outside the cone of uncertainty yeah they still project tropical storm some type of tropical storm winds for Oahu let me talk about 60 70 80 90 miles an hour no not that high in this case over 39 miles per hour okay so so that's that's and what's what's important even though let Olivia weekend you know it's very important people you know after Olivia occurs and people go Olivia wasn't that bad I'll forget about it until hurricane season 29 the that's not what we're trying to do we're trying to get people in order to make a difference to move the needle to prevent 50,000 structures from being damaged destroyed from a major hurricane people gotta think about these things all the time they gotta think about it now it's the new normal and prepare before we before we go to the break I just want to ask you what you have an S there and you have can I go back to that picture and have an S and a D okay what is that sign that stands for tropical storm D is a tropical depression so you'll see in this moment in this new in this these products from National Weather Service they'll have either an M for major hurricane H hurricane S tropical storm the tropical depression and that's that's what it's projected to be in the future is the wind shear phenomenon working now I think I think there's a little wind shear it's it and you know we would have to talk the National Weather Service there is some wind shear but I don't think it's as strong as the wind shear that Lane encountered a few weeks ago could we go to a more slider well let me ask you a question first though and that is could we have a surprise northerly turn here as it comes off Maui could it turn to the north and and the center of that wind hit Oahu is that possible I think it's it's slight it's probably it's not very possible I mean a National Weather Service has done has a pretty good handle and the direction of Olivia for this system and then even if it were to turn north which is probably it probably won't it's it's very unlikely that it will intensify so the winds right now are are I think they're 45 or 50 mile per hour sustained winds it's not like a it's like a weak tropical storm it's not it's not a strong tropical storm like a cell was yeah so is it fair to say we've been through the worst of it right now here at almost 330 well it's hard to say because we're just talking about the winds now and then there was the rain the rain has the rain bands have a larger extent than the wind so there's still some impacts possible for you know for the rain on Oahu and we know we don't know exactly what's going on in Maui now there there is a fair amount of rain going on right right now yeah in my house there's plenty of rain yeah okay we got any more pictures you want to go break now one last one maybe last picture okay that's another picture that's okay this is the same one okay this is another graph I that I use the three products that I find most useful for national weather service are the cone of uncertainty with the wind field and then this one is a tropical storm wind probability they also have a hurricane wind probability but it shows at this point in time where the center of the system is and say for Oahu there's a colored bar or legend at the bottom so on Oahu there's like a 40% chance with it that's where the yellow is that yellow is it's roughly a 40% chance that will get tropical storm winds on Oahu okay so I used that a lot and then the other one I use a lot I find very useful is the expected arrival time of tropical storm winds and this is all related to preparation yeah so we're gonna get the next report at six o'clock today 5 p.m. 5 p.m. today yeah and we'll know then I mean they'll tell us then what what the estimated time of arrival is I guess well yeah well they you they already I mean it's essentially arrived it's it's weakened it's it's weakened Olivia that's why I'm feeling I'm not feeling too bad about it because yes I surmise that even in case of the rain we've already seen the worst of it at least in my neighborhood well yeah well yeah it's hard to say because they're rain bands and you could get no rain and then another rain band could come around and and centric rain band yeah concentric rain band so hard to say less always listen to TV and radio for for the because they they they were in tune with National Weather Service I'm sort of like trying to give you a big picture of the risk that's very valuable to the future yeah and we're gonna go even a little more into the future in the next part we are we take a break first and then back and talk about the future and the connection of these storms all together yes on a global basis we'll be right back after this okay sure this is think tech Hawaii raising public awareness this then it's one on the faculty at UHC Grant College which is affiliated with NOAA we're talking today we're giving a status report on Olivia Olivia Olivia Olivia woman's name and what does Olivia have to do with Florence and other hurricanes so this is the part I like now you have more you have more photographs yeah what we're gonna talk about in this part of the show okay well I'd like to talk about the fact that we're in an El Nino watch right now so I'm gonna explain what that is what the significance is how could affect the risk and I want people to understand that there you know that there is a lot more risk than people think there is yeah yeah we can't be complacent about this yeah okay well you have more pictures let's sure let's go through them okay so this is a report by the NOAA Climate Prediction Center it was actually two days ago they put this out and part of NOAA it's just like NOAA is a huge organization like National Weather Service is part of NOAA Sea Grant we're affiliated with NOAA and this is the Climate Prediction Center these people are not on Hawaii they're in Baltimore, Maryland but there are a bunch of scientists studying climate climate they're looking at a big picture yeah and they're and specifically they're looking at something called El Nino so we're gonna talk about something called La Niña El Nino cycles in the Pacific and what is the significance of it what does it mean yeah so can we get the next let's go to the next one this is really getting more global okay but you're gonna see how it relates to Hawaii okay so currently we're in an El Nino neutral condition right now okay so we flip back and forth between La Niña and El Nino or if we're not in that that condition we're in a neutral position what do we like better El Nino or La Niña we would like better La Niña okay so so but you could see at the very bottom there's 60% chance of an El Nino in the northern hemisphere by fall 2018 increasing the 70% chance by winter of 2018 and 2019 so and this all relates to it relates to tropical cyclone activity to the hurricanes we're talking about so so we're about there's a 70% chance we're about to go into an El Nino by winter and when that happens this extreme weather will become more extreme more extreme right yeah so let's continue on okay with the story you're gonna give me a lot of concern here this okay well I'm just trying to explain everything so here is what El Nino looks like under normal conditions there's normal trade winds and there you could see off the equator and off South America their trade winds are moving the warm water to the west okay but during an El Nino the trade winds weaken and then the warm water along the equator does not move to the west but collects and collects along South America and and the northern part of South America by the way this is the breeding ground for all the tropical cyclones they all come from that off South America yeah a lot of them form there and then they travel to the west right to us to us right so that's the significance of this so we have the next slide okay so this is data from the National Weather Service from 1970 to 2017 and you could see the red years are El Nino the blue years are El Nino and the yellow is neutral and you could see that the greatest number of tropical cyclones is during El Nino years okay so in 82 we had Eva and that was it during an El Nino in 1992 we had a Niki that was during El Nino in 2015 we had what was called a super El Nino and the probably the strongest El Nino they ever had with the greatest number of tropical cyclones we've ever had okay so the unfortunately we're very fortunate that they all managed to miss us we were lucky yes but that doesn't last forever I'm even on a random basis what's the difference between a cyclone and a hurricane okay it's it's just terminology a tropical cyclone includes a hurricane a tropical storm and a tropical depression tropical cyclone means forming over the tropics you know zero to 22 degrees latitude and cyclonic circular circular circular action okay but can we go back to that slide again yeah okay so 2017 we had a super El Nino and you can see there are 16 tropical cyclones they think that that part may that may have been related to climate change and the warmer you know it's it's not there's no consensus but a lot of scientists think that it may be you mean El Nino or the number of storms did not see how strong that El the number well the El Nino they called it a super El Nino in 2015 it was it was stronger than so that's climate change made it into a super El Nino mate they some people think that bigger than any other and then it related and then and then it led to those 16 tropical cyclones okay and then in 2017 you see it's yellow so we're going in a neutral in 2018 we're in blue which is La Nina but we're about to go into neutral again and then we're about to go into an El Nino again 20 to 2019 yeah El Nino and that's why I'm saying these cycle these cycles are going to continue into the future there's going to be and if it's related to climate climate change and warming some of these El Ninos maybe get you know out of fuel and gas or you know it's worse they're going to be worse so people got to prepare for this type of constant activity where where Hector is coming by and then Lane and then Olivia and you know it's it's it's the new normal yeah it's it people got to realize that there is actual risk out there and they can't always count on these things missing us let me just pin one thing down Dennis it's no question that the exacerbation of this weather is due to climate change right well it's hard to say because I mean there's so many scientists see definitely sea surface temperatures are warmer so because there's always a question does climate change lead to greater frequency and magnitude of storms most intuitively you would say yes because the sea surface temperatures are warmer but a lot of scientists also say well when there's climate change there's more wind shear right remember wind shear is what to our lane apart so there's just so many factors involved but you know you got to take a look at the data itself too and that may be telling you that that there's a good likelihood that it could be happening there's no consensus but a lot of people think it is okay we talked about complacency yeah we're talking about the complacency of people in a highly populated area like Oahu do you have more slides let's do that okay let's just go over next slide okay so this was the 2015 year during the Super Al Nino and again 15 or 16 tropical cyclones in the Pacific and John Bravinder he was on your show with myself last week and when when people asked him is there any way to explain all these systems missing us yeah his answer was luck there's no reason these systems have missed us there's no physical reason why these systems have missed all of missed us so and next year our luck may turn yeah so I mean it's really we got a people got to be on their toes and prepare what does that mean we only have a minute left what does that mean okay so they need to prepare properly so that they don't get hurricane fatigue you know for instance don't return your supplies your supplies you bought for Olivia keep them mark them with a sharpie with expiration dates use them for your 2019 hurricane season if you're always going out to buy things and then returning them you're going to get hurricane fatigue you know everything you do should be could should consider both the short term and the long term what you're doing and you do the same thing for your water you don't need to buy cases of water buy plastic containers disposable plastic containers or or you know that are always on hand okay so this is all a ramp up it's all a training it's all a preparation time for us to deal with the season maybe 2019 in which we're not so lucky and if we're lucky in 2019 well there's always the years after that with more El Nino and more climate change right more extreme weather so you have to come back and tell us about I really appreciate you're coming in today Dennis sir this is kind of education it's so important people have to understand what's going on not only in the short term not only this afternoon but in the long term right we have a new normal a new way of life actually in the world yes thank you so much for coming down Dennis good to be here Jay thanks next time soon yeah