Ana remains a tropical storm Wednesday afternoon. Surf is expected to begin impacting Big Island shores Thursday night. By Friday evening, the island will start to experience strong winds, heavy rain fall and high surf. ADVERTISING Ana remains a tropical
Ana remains a tropical storm Wednesday afternoon. Surf is expected to begin impacting Big Island shores Thursday night. By Friday evening, the island will start to experience strong winds, heavy rain fall and high surf.
The storm is currently located about 640 miles southeast of Hilo and moving toward the west around 9 mph. The storm as of 2 p.m. was packing 70 mph winds. Tropical storm force winds currently extend outward up to 60 miles.
“It’s a very strong, high-end tropical storm,” said Chris Brenchley, Warning Coordinator for the Central Pacific Hurricane Center in Honolulu.
Ana remains south of a ridge of high pressure and encountered windshear overnight into Wednesday that kept the storm from strengthening into a hurricane, Brenchley said. Windshear often helps tear storms apart as they near the Hawaiian Islands.
“We expect that windshear will be on the decrease as we go through the day and we are forecasting that Tropical Storm Ana will become a hurricane sometime later today (Wednesday) and into this evening,” said Brenchley.
Once upgraded to a hurricane, Ana is forecast to pass over the Hawaiian Islands as a Category 1 storm. A Category 1 hurricane packs winds ranging from 74 mph to 95 mph.
“We are expecting Ana to maintain hurricane strength as it slowly moves across the Hawaiian Islands,” Brenchley said.
Surf and wind are expected to begin impacting the Big Island on Friday. The southern part of Hawaii Island is expected to see 15- to 30-foot waves. The southeast-facing shores of the Big Island will see the largest waves associated with the system.
“The entire state is under an area where there is a threat of significant winds, strong winds, also heavy rainfall is a good possibility as Ana moves through, particularly as it begins to approach the big island,” Brenchley said.
If the storm makes landfall on the Big Island, it will be the second tropical cyclone to hit the Big Island during the 2014 hurricane season.
The Big Island was lashed by Tropical Storm Iselle on Aug. 8. The storm damaged some 148 homes, caused an estimated $53 million in damage to the island’s agricultural industry and left thousands in East Hawaii without electricity. It took until about Aug. 23 to restore electricity to all the 25,000 Hawaii Island customers who lost power at the height of the storm.
Elsewhere in the Central North Pacific Basin, which is located between 140 degrees west longitude and the International Dateline, no tropical cyclone formation is expected through Wednesday night.
Central Pacific Hurricane Center officials predicted four to seven tropical cyclones this year in the Central North Pacific Basin. Overall, they give this season an 80 percent chance for a normal to above average number of tropical storms to form.
The Central Pacific hurricane season began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.
