NWS satellite image

HAMAKUA COAST – The National Weather Service has issued a Flash Flood Warning for the Hamakua Coast, lasting until 2:30 a.m. HST early Monday morning. According to the NWS:

NWS, Jan. 6, 2014

“At 11:18 pm HST… Radar showed heavy rain in a thunderstorm near Ookala… Or about 26 miles northwest of Hilo. Radar estimated rainfall rates were in excess of 3 inches per hour in this area. The area of heavy rain was nearly stationary. Other locations in the warning include but are not limited to Waipio Valley… Paauilo and Honokaa.”

The rest of the Big Island is under a Flash Flood Advisory.

Residents of the villages along the Hamakua Coast are reporting over social media that there is “torrential rain” and “huge lightning bolts”. Its been hardly a week since they were hammered by heavy rains in the storm that passed over Hawaii Island before New Years.

The rain is part of an upper level trough that is bringing “unstable atmospheric conditions with locally heavy rainfall and thunderstorms over the main Hawaiian island chain through Monday”, according to the National Weather Service. “The upper level system will linger just east of the Big Island into mid-week, which will maintain unstable conditions mainly over the eastern end of the state into Wednesday.”