High winds developed across the high elevations of the Big Island around Mauna Kea early on the 11th and continued through the early morning hours of the 12th. Peak wind gusts reached 81 mph during this event.
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The episode as NWS HFO wrote it up.
High winds developed across the high elevations of the Big Island around Mauna Kea early on the 11th and continued through the early morning hours of the 12th. Peak wind gusts reached 81 mph during this event.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Honolulu, HI wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Dec 10, 8:44 PM HST, 4 hours 16 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Honolulu HI 844 PM HST Sat Dec 10 2016 .SYNOPSIS... An upper level trough near the western end of the state will bring overcast skies and periods of rain mainly from Molokai to the Big Island through early Sunday morning. This band of clouds and showers will gradually shift eastward through Monday, resulting in slowly improving conditions from west to east across the island chain. Drier weather is then expected from Tuesday through Wednesday as weak high pressure builds north of the state. However, this will be short-lived, as an extended period of unsettled and rainy weather may develop across the islands starting Thursday. && .DISCUSSION... A couple of weak surface lows are located northwest and north of the islands. These systems are linked together by a slow moving, or nearly stationary, front. Elsewhere, a 1025 mb high is near 28N 129W...or about 1760 miles east-northeast of Hilo. A weak surface ridge extends from this high to near the Big island. The close proximity of all of these features to the islands is maintaining a light synoptic flow across the region. As a result, gentle south winds continue near the Big Island, while the flow is mainly light and variable elsewhere. Loops of water vapor satellite imagery show an upper level trough near the western end of the island chain early this evening. This feature, which appears to be propagating slowly toward the east- northeast, is contributing to the unstable atmospheric conditions across the state. This instability combined with abundant moisture in the vicinity of Maui County and the Big Island are producing a band of overcast layered cloud with embedded numerous showers from just east of Oahu to the Big Island. The estimated highest tops of the clouds within the band extend up to over 40 thousand feet. Radar reflectivity shows mostly stratiform precipitation concentrated across Maui County, as well as the northern and northwestern Big Island. Cirrus clouds and scattered to broken low clouds with a few light showers along the western edge of the layered cloud band are passing over Oahu. Scattered to broken low clouds and scattered showers are moving over Kauai and the adjacent coastal waters. Soundings from early this afternoon indicated precipitable water values of 1.41 inches at Lihue and 1.93 inches at Hilo, with the latter showing a saturated vertical profile. Also, temperatures on the Big Island summits remain just below freezing this evening with layered clouds deep enough to support snowfall tonight. A Winter Storm Warning remains in effect through early Sunday morning. Snow may be possible from Sunday into Monday morning for the Big Island summits, but we are anticipating shallow clouds will eventually move in from the south sometime after daybreak Sunday morning. Therefore, depending on when the deep layered clouds begin to depart the area, we will determine if the Warning needs to be extended beyond 6 am HST Sunday morning, or downgrade it to a Winter Weather Advisory. The upper level trough will lift continue to propagate toward the east-northeast, which will eventually push the layered cloud band slowly eastward through Sunday night. The surface lows will also lift northeast, which will allow a weak ridge to build in from the north and bring gentle north winds across the western portion of the state on Sunday. Somewhat cooler and drier air will likely accompany this flow regime. The Big Island, and to a lesser extent Maui County, will still have some lingering clouds and showers on Sunday. The Big Island will likely continue to have wetter than normal conditions through Monday. Model solutions remain in good agreement showing improving conditions from Tuesday through Wednesday as weak high pressure builds north of the island chain, bringing gentle trade winds for all islands. However, it appears that this improvement will be short-lived, since the GFS and ECMWF models, as well as many of the the GFS / ECMWF ensemble members, show a deep stacked low developing just to the northwest or west of the island chain late Wednesday. This feature appears to deepen and meander west or northwest of Kauai from Thursday into next weekend. Although model solutions differ on the exact details about the low and its impact on our weather at this time, they do indicate that an extended period of very unsettled wet weather will likely develop starting Thursday. && .AVIATION... Layered clouds continue to spread across eastern Oahu through the Big Island, producing light to moderate rain across most of this area. Terminals from PHMK and eastward will likely see periods of tempo MVFR through the night. AIRMET SIERRA for mountain obscuration is posted over eastern Oahu and all of Maui County and the Big Island. AIRMET ZULU for light to moderate icing in layered clouds is posted from eastern Oahu through Big Island. The rest of Oahu will see isolated showers passing from the south. Kauai will see scattered showers, at times heavy, through the night. An upper jet on the east side of an upper trough over Kauai will continue to produce tempo moderate upper level turb, AIRMET TANGO is posted. As the trough shifts east through Sunday, so will this area of upper turbulence. && .MARINE... Winds and seas will likely remain below the Small Craft Advisory criteria through Wednesday. However, a new surface low moving to a position northwest or west of Kauai on Thursday may cause increasing south to southwest winds and seas across parts of the state. Mariners who are planning activities later this week should monitor future updates to the wind / seas forecasts. In addition, periods of heavy rain may cause reduced visibilities over portions of the coastal waters starting Thursday. A short-period north to north-northeast swell will linger mainly over the western half of the state through Sunday. A longer-period northwest swell associated with a former gale near the International Date Line is expected to fill in from Sunday into Monday, then peak Monday night, before slowly fading from Tuesday through Wednesday. A longer fetch developing between a building surface high far north of the state and an elongated trough/front extending northeast from the state will generate a shorter-period north- northeast swell beginning late Monday/Tuesday. This swell will gradually veer around to the east by next weekend. Surf is forecast to remain below High Surf Advisory criteria along east facing shores. However, there may be a concern with locally enhanced wave runup due to the larger spring tides and the fact that water levels at the tide gages around the state have recently been higher than predicted. Forecast models remain in good agreement that another gale low developing northeast of Japan on Sunday will track toward the Aleutian Islands early next week. A new northwest swell will likely fill in from this source Thursday, and hold into the weekend before trending down. Although confidence remains low, surf may approach the High Surf Advisory criteria along north and west facing shores of some of the smaller islands on Friday. && .HFO WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... Winter Storm Warning until 6 AM HST Sunday for Big Island Summits. && DISCUSSION/MARINE...Houston AVIATION...Eaton
The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
1 high wind. Local standard time, as filed.
Sustained winds reached 60 to 75 mph for the duration of this event at the CFHT anemometer on Mauna Kea summit.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Hawaii in 2016Every state in 2016This day in weather historyWarnings in Hawaii, December 2016
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 665804.