I am concerned about a Pacific weather system that may eventually cause serious flooding in New Mexico.  Currently the National Hurricane Center says there is an 80% chance of this weather system turning into at least a tropical depression.  The latest reliable model (ECMWF) has the system becoming at least a tropical storm and reading the mouth of the Gulf of California. These systems, historically, cause flooding in the Southwest or Central United States.  Over the next seven days, the NWS is forecast as much as 5" of rain in eastern New Mexico which could be 1/3rd of its annual rainfall in the area. This has the potential to cause serious flooding. For what it is worth, the ECMWF, which came out after the above forecast was made, has a larger area of heavy rain that covers most of the state.  Typically, once the heavy rain occurs in the Southwest, heavy rain occurs in the Great Plains, somewhere from northern Texas to Nebraska. It is too soon to pin down where tha...

The tropical depression is forecast to strengthen into Tropical Storm Mokie on Friday.. However, the storm is not forecast to reach hurricane intensity. The center of the storm will stay south of the Hawaiian Islands. HOWEVER, heavy rain is again forecast to occur on the Big Island.  As much as 15 inches of rain is forecast on the Island of Hawaii which will cause a recurrence of flooding but it should not be as bad as occurred with Lala. 

Here is the first National Hurricane Center forecast for the low pressure system that may affect Hawaii. The tropical depression is expected to become a tropical storm (" S ") by tomorrow. The white area is the area of uncertainty regarding the center of the storm, not the storm's total effects. There is a risk of heavy rain over the islands, especially the Big Island (the Island of Hawaii) which has severely hit by Lala. Hawaii almost never is struck by tropical storms/hurricsanes except in years with moderate to strong El Nino's. This year has one of the strongest El Nino's ever.  Because I cannot assess the current status of the washouts in Hawaii and Maui, I'm not in a position to give advice with the exception of putting together a "go bag." Recommended contents are below, although they left off plenty of diapers, if appropriate.  Please follow local officials' recommendations.  Of course, I will update later today and tomorrow. 

The National Hurricane Center says there is a 90% chance of a developing system southeast of Hawaii turning into at least a tropical depression.  Very preliminary indications are that a tropical system, with possible heavy rain, will affect the islands the latter half of the weekend or the first of next week.  I will, of course, provide updates. 

Remember, the primary threat of a tropical depression is heavy rain and possibly flooding. If the wind speed gets to 40 mph, it would become a tropical storm.  I will continue to mentor this for you.