How much Rain???

[Dave Smith]

For you numbers nuts, the weather service recorded 27.44 inches at Hilo Airport over a 24-hour period ending at about 1 p.m. on Nov. 2, 2000, breaking the old 24-hour record of 22.3 inches from 1979. That storm also dumped 16.17 inches on Nov. 2, a record for a calendar day in November. The all-time calendar day record there is 16.87 inches from 1979. The November 2000 storm, which left Highway 11 mangled in KaÔu, also dumped 37 inches over a 24-hour period over that district's Kapapala Ranch, but that fell short of the state 24-hour record of 38.00 inches which occurred at Kilauea, Kauai on Jan. 24-25 in 1956.

Of course if you want to talk about REALLY soggy, ponder these record rainfall figures from the book "Extreme Weather": 4 days - 62 inches in Kukaiau in Hamakua in 1902; 8 days - 82 inches, same place and year; 1 month - 148.83 inches over Mt. Waialeale on Kauai in 1982; and 1 year ÐÊ704.83 at Kukui, Kauai in 1982. While Hawaii holds those records, the book says the most for a one-hour period is 14.30 inches in West Virginia in 1943, and for a 24-hour period it's 43 inches in Alvin, Texas in 1979.

[Charles Moore]

Here's a higher resolution one taken from Hilo bayfront. Click the "watch in HD" icon in the lower right corner of the video window.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wluOY5odN6Q

[csgray]

Morganlady,
Cell phones can get their batteries run down if they are turned on while in an area with no signal for them to detect. I have been told they just keep searching for a signal, each time running using a little juice from the battery. We turn ours off when we visit a friend in Nanawale to prevent it from draining while we are there, same thing with driving to the West side by either Saddle Road, or the Hamakua route. Why have our cell drain itself searching for nonexistent signals?

Carol

[morganlady]

Oh, thanks Carol. My cellphone rings while I'm in the house, but no one can hear me till I walk out in the street, where we can talk (and have, indeed) for hours. If it rains, I can also sit in the car.
The signal varies throughout the day - don't know what affects it - stormcells, wind, magma shifts?