The Meteorology of the Maui Firestorm

In this paper, we discuss the meteorology of the Maui firestorm, including the synoptic- and meso-scale weather patterns, the role of climate in Hawaii’s wildfires, and changes in land use and triggers for the wildfires. Finally, we propose to bring new regional numerical weather prediction (NWP) capabilities detailed in this paper to bear on the problem of wildfire hazard estimation and prediction on tropical islands.