Tropical Storm Lala targets Hawaii, set to bring heavy rain and rough surf

 

Hawaii is bracing for a tropical storm that threatens to bring heavy rain, damaging wind and dangerous surf to the islands this weekend.

Hawaii Gov. Josh Green declared a statewide emergency Thursday, allowing officials to activate the National Guard and access emergency funding as the state prepares for Lala.

Showers and thunderstorms roughly 800 miles southeast of the Big Island strengthened into Tropical Storm Lala early Thursday morning, according to the National Hurricane Center. Eastern parts of the state are already under a hurricane watch, through Friday afternoon, meaning hurricane conditions are possible within the next 36 hours. Lala is forecast to reach hurricane strength with sustained winds of 75 mph within the next several days.

The storm’s exact path and strength remain uncertain, but it would dodge a rare landfall on its current forecast track. It is expected to be near the Big Island on Saturday, and pass south of the smaller islands on Sunday.

Confidence in the exact track should improve closer to the weekend once the storm is more organized.

Landfalls on the Hawaiian islands have only happened a handful of times in the modern record. The last tropical system to make landfall was Tropical Storm Olivia in 2018, which came ashore on Maui — that island’s first landfall since recordkeeping began in the 1950s.

But storms that pass just south of the islands can have a similar or even greater impact than a direct hit: When surface winds and the storm’s track point in the same direction, they can combine forces and drive more water and wind onshore.