Air motions over the windward coast of the Island of Hawaii¹

1 Hawaii Institute of Geophysics Contribution No. 165.

Abstract

Attention is called to the strong land-sea breeze regime which dominates local winds over the eastern slopes of the Island of Hawaii. An analysis is made of the diurnal variation of the winds measured at Hilo Airport by conventional soundings during the summer of 1965. The diurnal wind oscillation has a maximum range of over 6 m sec?1 at the surface and extends to an altitude of over 3 km. An example of the trajectory of a radar-tracked, constant volume balloon is analyzed to illustrate the combined effect of sea breeze and barrier deflection flow on the local winds measured over the slopes.