Category: Weather

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Wednesday/ Hawaii is burning 🔥

This summer is no exception when it comes to apocalyptic scenes of fires and floods, worsened by the changes in the planet’s climate.
There is very bad news out of Hawaii, as well, now— of destructive firestorms that started yesterday and continued into today.

Thomas Fuller, reporting for the New York Times:
From the air, the town of Lahaina looks incinerated. Charred palm trees are reduced to slender matchsticks protruding into the smoky sky. Homes are ash. Streets are deserted.
The firestorm that tore through the western shores of Hawaii’s Maui island on Tuesday and continued on Wednesday has killed at least six people and forced the evacuation of more than 2,000, the authorities said. It was the deadliest wildfire in the state’s history, according to Clay Trauernicht, a tropical fire specialist at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Fast-moving wildfires wreaked havoc on the island of Maui, trapping locals and tourists. Strong winds linked to Hurricane Dora several hundreds of miles to the south fanned the flames, but as of Wednesday it was not known how the fires had started.
The hall of Lahaina’s historic Waiola Church and nearby Lahaina Hongwanji Mission, on fire.
[Photo by Matthew Thayer/The Maui News/AP]
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Sunday ☀️

All days seem to be sun days this time of year.
These at the end of July are the driest on the calendar— meaning that it almost never rains on these days in the Pacific Northwest.

The mountain is out (Mount Ranier)— seen with a waxing gibbous moon from over Lake Washington on Friday.
Here in the city of Seattle we have had mild and calm weather all along so far this summer, with very little wildfire smoke to deal with. It’s just been very dry, drier than usual.
[Posted by NWSSeattle@ NWSSeattle on X on Fri 7/28]
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Thursday/ the full package 🌬️

We need a little bit of the rain (and the cold) that is about to hit Cape Town this weekend, up here in the Pacific Northwest.

The headlines on the Friday edition of Die Burger’s front page:
THE CITIZEN
FULL PACKAGE FOR THE WEEKEND
– Strong Wind
– Heavy Rain 
– Snow 
– Heavy Seas
Here comes a monster!
Western Cape
Cold front
.. and all of this followed by Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1893)?
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Monday/ a little rain ☔

There was a little rain today— the first in 33 days.
The gardens and fields are parched this time of year in the Pacific Northwest, and we will take what we can get.

The hydrangea in my front yard.
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Monday/ Ginza 🏬

It was another 36°C (97°F) here in Tokyo, and we ducked into a department store every block or two as we walked around the streets of Ginza— Tokyo’s famous up-market shopping, dining and entertainment district.

Pictures:
Ginza subway station’s fancy decor gives a hint of what’s to come above-ground;
Stylish dressers and parasols, at the Koban (police box) station in Ginza;
Architecture along Matsuya-dori (street);
A misting station offering a little respite from the heat;
Cupid looking to make mischief, at the Vacheron Constantin watch store;
Fancy window display.

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Wednesday/ it’s hot 🥵

A diagram of the Yamanote Line loop (the real loop is an irregular blob on a map). The double track of 34.5 km (21.4 mi) of rail opened in 1885 (138 years ago) and is run by JR East (the East Japan Railway Company).
Here’s the new-ish Takanawa Gateway Station (it opened Mar. 2020), the 30th station to be added onto the Yamanote Line, and the first one in 50 years. Construction of large apartment buildings and offices around the station is still in progress— called Takanawa Gateway City, and scheduled for completion in 2025.
Here comes the lime green Yamanote Line train. Form over function: the flat front profile is obviously not anticipating bullet train speeds to be attained.
Baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani on a billboard for Seiko watches outside the Yodobashi Camera store in Shinjuku. He was actually in Seattle just this week for the 2023 All-Star game there, and is about to become a free agent (his contract with the Los Angeles Angles is ending). ‘Come to Seattle, Come to Seattle’ chanted the baseball fans.
Yodobashi Camera has several separate stores near Shinjuku, each dedicated to certain kinds of appliances or equipment. Here is an inside-outside display of binoculars of all shapes and sizes.
Out in the blazing heat again in Shinjuku, now on my way to Lemon Camera— located on the floor where the yellow strip runs in the building on the right. My mission for the morning was to try and find the elusive and ever-out-of-stock Fujifilm X100V compact camera (to buy one), but even here in Tokyo all the stores tell me they have none available.
Here’s the cavernous main hall in Shinagawa Station, the station close to my hotel.

We had 36°C (97 °F) here in Tokyo today.

I put urban survival gear in my backpack (water bottle, towel, wide-brimmed hat, sunglasses)  and made a run out to Shinjuku on the famous Yamanote Line after the morning rush hour on the subway trains was over.

 

 

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Sunday/ summer days ☀️

We continue to count our blessings here in the Pacific Northwest with mild, sunny days and clear skies.
It was 78°F/ 26°C today.

Italian Summer, 1980s. (Could it just be a matter of time before those white shirts get red pasta sauce on them?)
Photo by Slim Aarons, posted on Twitter @historydefined.
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Wednesday/ hello summer 🌞

We are blessed with goldilocks weather here in Seattle at the start of summer— mild and sunny, with a high of 72 °F (22 °C) today.
Sunrise was at 5.11 am and sunset at 9.10 pm, so we had just a touch under 16 hours of sunlight.

The amigos in action this morning at the Mt. Baker Park tennis (and pickle ball) courts. Everyone is up at the kitchen line (the kitchen is the non-volley zone at the net) and showing good form. 🤗
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Happy Juneteenth 👏

Mauritania’s endless sea of sand dunes hides an open secret: An estimated 10% to 20% of the population lives in slavery. But as one woman’s journey shows, the first step toward freedom is realizing you’re enslaved.
– John D. Sutter writing for CNN Interactive (In 1981, Mauritania became the last country in the world to abolish slavery. Activists are arrested for fighting the practice. The government denies it exists).

Happy Juneteenth.
It is the third time around for the newest federal holiday in the US, Juneteenth National Independence Day, which celebrates the end of slavery in the United States.

There is still a lot of differences in the way states treat the day, though: some commemorate it as an official holiday, some just a day of observance, and others something in between. (In Washington State it was made a permanent state holiday in 2022).

The cool weather and on-again off-again rain of the weekend continued on Monday here in Seattle.
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Saturday 🌧

It’s a cool and rainy weekend here in the Emerald City (64°F / 18°C)— a good day to go for a Starbucks coffee, or for a beer.

Check out the neon signs inside the Marco Polo bar in Seattle’s SoDo* district.
*South of downtown
[Photo credit to Steve for taking the picture 😁]
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Happy Friday ☔️

There was a slight drizzle on and off today outside, which was very welcome.
Very little rain fell in May.

Peach-leaved bellflowers (Genus Campanula, Latin for ‘little bell’) here on Capitol Hill in Seattle.
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Wednesday/ sweaty 😅

It was warm here in the city today (85 °F/ 30 °C).
Most of the Pacific Northwest has— so far— been spared the smoke from Canada that is plaguing New York City and the Northeast.

The amigos were out on the pickle ball courts at Mount Baker park this morning while it was still OK to play.
We picked the pickle ball court that has a nice patch of shade on the one side of the net.
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Sunday/ at Madison Park beach 🛶

I made it down to Madison Park beach this afternoon.
A smattering of heliophiles were sunning themselves on the lawn.
There was plenty of sunlight today, but only mild temperatures (70 °F/ 21 °C).

Madison Park beach on Lake Washington today. That’s the State Route 520 floating bridge (officially the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge, and shorthand ‘520 Bridge’) and Medina in the background.
The water’s edge consists mostly of pebbles here, but there is a sandy portion on the south by a tall apartment building.
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Wednesday/ wildfire smoke, already 😕

We’re coming out of a few warm days— the warmest 89 °F (32 °C), on Monday.
Today the sunlight was a little more brown/orange than usual.
The reason: wildfire smoke from Alberta, Canada, has been drifting down into the skies over Washington State.

Downtown Calgary from Crescent Rd and 5 St. NW, obscured by wildfire smoke, on Tuesday morning.
[Text & picture posted by Andrew McIntyre @andrewmcintyre on Twitter]
Wildfire smoke from Canada moved over the Puget Sound region early this morning. It’s still well above the ground, so air quality has not been impacted. We do not expect much reach the surface. The winds should shift by Thurs and push the smoke out.
[Text & picture posted by PS Clean Air Agency @pscleanair on Twitter]

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Friday/ rain ☔

Happy Friday, the first one in May.
It was a very wet day for May, but maybe Mother Nature is just getting us caught up with the rain.
Sea-Tac Airport had recorded slightly less than 12 in. of rain in the first four months of 2023, which is about 5 inches below average.

It’s May, so the rhododendron bushes are blooming. This is the prettiest one that I found tonight.  
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Friday/ cheers 🥂

It was a lovely day with blue skies all around and 78 °F (26 °C)— a high temperature for late April.
We drop back into the normal range by Sunday, some 10 degrees cooler.

‘Cheers from Oregon’ says a little panel on the side of this Hop Valley Brewing Co. beer truck, here on 15th Avenue on Capitol Hill.
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Friday 🤗

Happy Friday.
Here’s another Nineteenth Avenue Tree Canopy report: looking fine, with the green of the budding leaves on the tree limbs just starting to show.

Seattle and western Washington have been locked in a cool, active weather pattern much of the spring, but the days are getting warmer. (Only 52°F/ 11°C today, but the weather people are promising us 72°F/ 22°C by next Friday).
That’s the Microsoft Connector company bus in the distance. Maybe it has employees on that are working on the Bing AI chatbot. I need to check it out— or create a ChatGPT account, to see what the brouhaha over the latest online AI tools is all about. Can the AI bot write me a poem about fossils?  Hmm, I wonder.
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Thursday/ 🌸

The blossoms are out here on Capitol Hill’s 16th Avenue— but the weather is still on the chilly side. We only had 52 °F (11 °C) here in the city today.
(We’re on track to experience the first recorded April without a single 60-degree day, according to forecasters, reports the Seattle Times).

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Wednesday/ a geodesic dome 🗻

The New York Times posted pictures shared by their readers in California, of the snow there. I like this one.

A geodesic dome in the Santa Cruz mountains. The snowpack in the vast Sierra Nevada mountain range is the deepest it’s been in decades, exceeding 200% of the normal snowpack depth in some areas.
[Photo by Karrie Gaylord]