Good Morning! (Sort of)

I just managed to get about 85 minutes of sleep. I had dreams the storm was over. 

It's not. 

Well, not really. 

It's still dumping rain here, it's still dark, and it's quite breezy, although the gusts seem to have abated some. One other development is that the phone lines have finally dropped somewhere, and I have no internet. Thank goodness I paid my cellphone bill. :)

Continuing Saga of Iselle

I'm currently enjoying a break in the wind. I'm sure it'll be back though. But we are getting a fair amount of rain. I'm lucky to be off-grid and still have power. If you believe the news reporter twitter feeds, it sounds like most of this island as well as Maui is in the dark. At least on this section of the grid, it's power related and not pole related, as the DSL is still working.

Had a few nervous moments with the wind earlier. I was even halfway to grabbing Lucy as I yelled a few key expletives at one point. 

But all is better, at least for now. 

It looks like the storm is kind of stalling out just east of South Point, which means the winds are slowing down, but it's also moving slower. So this event will take a bit longer than originally planned. 

The biggest impact this will have is one of rainfall. Granted, we're no strangers to rain on this hill, but from a bigger perspective, this could be a very very big deal. One twitter person posted a graph of the current flow of the Wailuku river. The record flow was (WAS) somewhere above 5,000 cfm. Currently the river is at THREE times that amount. 

The lasting impact of this storm could very well be unbelievable. 

Rain is stopping. Wind coming. More later. 

Still here and dry!

I doubt anyone on the mainland who would read this is still up, but just in case, here's the update. The center of the storm has finally arrived on the island. It appears that the mountains have started pushing the storm a little south, and it's weakening. Supposedly. I've got some wind and rain at the moment, but nothing too worrisome yet. As I'm now approaching my bedtime, I'm pretty tired and just want to sleep this off. But I figure I'll stick it out for another hour or two before I sound the all clear, so to speak. 

More later. 

Hmmmm....

Oddities abound. 

Right now, the frogs are chirping, the rain has stopped, the river is raging, and according to the radar, we should be getting pounded by the storm. 

At any rate, all is well, the yurt is holding up, and I'm exhausted from all this prep and nervous waiting. 

Hooray!

A Little Wiggle

The storm is still pretty mellow, although I got my first wiggle on the tension cable that's holding my roof down. There's been some flappy flappy action around the windows, but nothing too startling yet.

Wiggle:

During a break in the rain:

I can't see my house from here: 

Lastly, there must be a ton of rain on the mountain, because I can hear the stream below going nuts. 

Warming Up

The rain and wind have arrived in earnest now. Kalewa is most likely on the last flight to Oahu leaving in 10 minutes, so kiko, Lucy, and I are hanging out in the yurt pretending we can hear the TV.  Right now, the weather is not much more than a typical rainstorm with a bit of wind. So far so good. Also, the wind hasn't really tested my roof yet, so that's also good.

Also, per Gary, we're now at 1.2" of rain for the day.

So here's a current video, even though the weather just lulled a bit.

All Set

Prep is done. Off to help the neighbors. 

The rain is starting to be a bit more persistent. 

As of noon, we've had 0.57 inches of rain since midnight. More updates on the way (thx, Gary). 

And how's this for spooky?

And So it Begins

If the meteorologists are correct, this looks as though it's going to be the real deal. 

I'm just about all wrapped up with my preparations, and after that, it'll just be a lot of thumb-twiddling intermixed with (hopefully rare) moments of panic. 

For those of you who are like me, and have never experienced a storm like this before, it's been interesting this morning.  I woke up at 4:30, and it was overcast. Since then, we've had showers, followed by a bit of breeze, then sunshine.  And it's been through that cycle 2-1/2 times now. Nothing severe, nothing crazy, just wandering edges of the storm, I guess. 

See? Now this round of rain has stopped and I can head back out for one last pass around the yurt. 

Iselle and Julio, Sitting in a Tree....

Ugh. Guess what? It's hurricane season! Yay! Iselle will be here tomorrow, with Julio on her heels. Today has been the calm between the storms. 

More later on developments. 

Yay! Preparations!

Check out this awesome map:

Yup. That looks comforting. :-/

Nonetheless, I'm sure the yurt is up to the challenge, but just in case, I'm packing up some breakables, sealing up some electronics, and making sure my raincoat is handy. 

Fingers crossed, folks. This is gonna be a close one.