Hurricane Lowell surged near the Hawaiian Islands this week, leaving a trail of downed trees and power lines, crumbled roads, sunken boats and destroyed piers on the island of Kauai.<\/p>\n
Residents were left to grapple not only with the damage, but the rising risks to the tropical archipelago as sea surface temperatures climb.<\/p>\n
Despite its location, stretching across roughly 1,500 miles in the central north Pacific Ocean, Hawaii typically avoids the worst effects from hurricanes. In fact, the island chain so often dodges direct hits from the violent storms, that it\u2019s been quipped they have a force field around them.<\/a><\/p>\n But Lowell was the second named storm to brush by the islands so far this year. In August, Hurricane Lala hit the Big Island and Oahu with damaging winds, the first time hurricane-force gusts have been recorded there in 155 years.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cAn event of this magnitude is somewhat rare,\u201d Michael Brennan, director of the National Hurricane Center said<\/a> during a recent broadcast discussion on Lowell\u2019s forecast, adding that Hawaii has not had a direct hurricane landfall since Iniki in 1992. That violent storm unleashed 145 mile-per-hour winds<\/a> as it tore through Kauai, destroying or damaging roughly 70% of the island\u2019s homes and businesses.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not luck (or a force field) that typically protected the islands, but location, according to Dr Nicholas Grondin, assistant professor of Environmental Science at the University of Tampa. Among the most isolated chain of islands on Earth, Hawaii is simply a small target in the vast open ocean, Grondin explained in an editorial published by the Conversation.<\/p>\n Most approaching storms also must pass over cooler water temperatures to the east of the islands, which helps calm them. \u201cWithout warm oceans to provide fuel, hurricanes tend to weaken and fizzle out as they approach the islands,\u201d Grondin said.<\/p>\n