Puna Weather
Friday 14th August 2026
Lala brings 30-40mph winds beginning tonight and 40-50mph with higher gusts Saturday. There is a possibility for hurricane force winds (>75mph) on Saturday for all of our forecast area (windward Hawaii Island). Rain will be intense and long lived and it's going to be hot and humid... very uncomfortable through Monday morning.
Despite the usual daily minimum in tropical storm activity, Lala maintained its strength today, due in large part from better alignment between the low level center and the deepest convection. Now convection has wrapped all the way around the center of circulation and we're seeing the pressure drop as the hurricane hunters make their passes. We're also continuing to see the strongest winds on the northern side of the storm.
Between now an landfall the upper air environment will change significantly. Currently there is good outflow to the northeast, but that is shifting to the north of the storm in 12 hours as the storm encounters diverging winds aloft immediately east of our island. Although this will bring some vertical shear to the storm, it will also supercharge the convection. The divergent flow in the upper level (200mb chart) pulls air from the storm, which is replaced by winds at the surface pushing into the storm. This chimney effect is the main reason the GFS blows up the convective complex as the storm approaches our island (simulated IR loop). As such, there is the possibility for extremely stormy weather from Nanawale/Waa-Waa to Hilo and up the Hamakua coast from morning to night tomorrow, Saturday. This is a local thing and short lived, once the storm clears our island it should be greatly weakened before impacting Maui and Oahu.
Please make preperations appropriate for hurricane conditions because we might see them after all. The latest GFS shows landfall at 989mb whereas Iselle was at 1001mb.
