Pō'aihala

rain of Kane'ohe/He'eia Watershed

Welcome!

"'Ino Ko'olau ē, 'ino Ko'olau

'Aikena i ka ua o Ko'olau

Ke ua maila i Mā'eli'eli

Ke ho'owa'awa'a maila i He'eia

Ke kūpā lā ka ua i ke kai

Ha'a hula le'a ka ua

I 'Āhuimanu, ka ua hō'oni

Ho'onaue i ka pu'u ko'a

Ka ua Pō'aihala o Kahalu'u

Lu'ulu'u ē, lu'ulu'u iho nei au

I ka pū'olo waimaka o ka 'ōnohi

Ke kulu iho nei ē

E uē kāua ē"

Rain-1.mp3

Pō'aihala rain Score, Recorded by Website Author

"Vile is Ko'olau, stormy is Ko'olau

Worn and eroded by the Ko'olau rain

Raining down upon Mā'eli'eli

Carving Grooves into He'eia

Digging at the ocean

The rain merrily dances

At 'Āhuimanu, making things move

Shaking the coral piles

The Pō'aihala rain of Kahalu'u

So oppressive, I am overladen

With a bundle of tears in my eyes

Flowing down

Let us weep together"

Excerpt from "Hānau Ka Ua: Hawaiian Rain Names" (2015) compiled by Collette Leimomi Akana, translation by Collette Leimomi Akana, Pg. 232-233, Kamehameha Publishing.

Little John Dwarf Bottle Brush during rainstorm.

Taken by website author

View of Ko'olaus from Windward Community College. Taken by webpage author

The Mo’olelo featured here is from a prayer chant to nature by Hi’iakaikapoliopele, the translation was supplied by Collette Leimomi Akana who also wrote the book from which this piece is cited, "Hānau Ka Ua: Hawaiian Rain Names,” (pg. 232-233, 2015). The purpose of this webpage to show appreciation to the water body of choice, originally stated as rain, later narrowed down to rain of Kane’ohe, and finally focused specifically on the rain Pō'aihala. The specification process was not easy as Kane’ohe, according to Akana’s book, possesses multiple rains including ‘Āpaukeau, Hōli’o, Kua’o’e, amongst others, all associated with different portions of the area. Windward Community College was chosen as the point of reference, due to its proximity to my own home: our instructor Jaimey Hamilton-Faris identified the rain through association with the He’eia watershed and the Mo’olelo. Rains in Hawai’i are named for various reasons, sometimes after people, places they are associated with, characteristics and so on. In the case of Pō'aihala, its name comes from the Hawaiian words for around and the hala trees (also known as pandanus), highly fitting for the area.

Map sourced via Ko'olau.NET

The Pō'aihala rains feed the He’eia watershed, running through the valley, down the upper half of Kāne’ohe, into the He’eia fishpond and the bay.

The beating of rain is out the window, and my heart leaps in astounding pleasure. As the drops fall and ring out, the birds sing, and the geckos cry, and I am reminded that we are very much still alive.

Water

Do we ever stop to think where our rains actually come from? Since our early years in elementary school, we are taught a simplified version of the hydrological system; water is evaporated from the earth, into the air to form clouds, then those clouds get too full, eventually dropping the water back down to the earth in the form of rain or other types of precipitation. But what if we take it a step further?

The water we know of here on earth had formed millions of years ago from asteroids and other forms of space debris pelting into our early earth’s heated surface, introducing hydrogen which then bonded to the large amounts of oxygen present in our atmosphere (PBS Eons, 2022).

Once the earth cooled enough, our oceans formed, and the hydrological cycle was born. The water droplets born from this process remained throughout all that time, freezing, and melting through every ice age and warming periods of the earth, sustaining early life forms in the evolutionary chain and eventually becoming a vital part of our anatomy. We drink water, sweat water, cry water, spit water, bleed water, and expel many other substances in which water is a necessary ingredient. Our bodily water eventually somehow exits our bodies and joins water droplets out in the world, which were likely also expelled by other living beings as well! All of that water will eventually end up reentering the atmosphere, gathering with more airborne water droplets, then more, and more, forming humid pockets of air, then cooling down to form clouds. It eventually gathers with more clouds, then gets high enough in the atmosphere and cool enough to begin dropping precipitation, reintroducing all of that water back to the earth and all of us living on it. These steps might vary of course, taking into account that ice exists and

Learn more about the birth of water on our planet here!

can contain water for even longer periods of time, as in permafrost; or that some water does not get absorbed at all but just evaporates back into the atmosphere to relive that all over again. Nevertheless, the water that was at some point born from space dust has at another point been inside us, our ancient ancestors, plants, ice age glaciers, lakes, rivers, the ocean, and will someday be introduced to our future descendents in some form or another. And at the root of this water exchange, is rain.

Rain in Hawai'i

In the prior analysis on water and where rain comes from, the process by which rain forms was lightly discussed. However, the island of Hawai’i have a few particularly unique features that assist in the formation of rain clouds.

On Oahu, the Ko’olau mountains catch air currents, such as the Trade Winds, causing them to rise into the atmosphere which is called Orographic Lifting (seen on the following image). This causes the air to cool, decreasing the amount of water the air can carry and thereby forming Orthographic clouds, rain bearing clouds. Eventually, it begins to rain, providing the moisture needed to sustain the lush rainforests the Windward side is so famous for. (Giambelluca, Accessed 2023) The Ko’olaus are also just low enough that Orthographic clouds at a certain level can roll over and distribute rain to the interior of the island. For more information on rain formation, please take a look at the Rain Atlas of Hawai’i website.

Image borrowed from the Rain Atlas of Hawai'i Website.

Rainfall

Rainfall can be calculated through various means, including raingages, plantation weather reports, and individuals’ own research on rainfall. This information is gathered and used to create datasets from which researchers can analyze the amount of rainfall within a certain amount of time. These datasets are accessible online through various websites. In the case of Hawai’i your best choices for this data found during this research are the National Weather Service, which only offers the numerical data, and the Hawai’i Analysis and Mapping Application found through Ikewai.com. The Hawai’i Analysis and Mapping Application collects available rainfall data through advanced means, which can be viewed on the interactive mapping tool ("Hawai'i Precipitation Tool," Accessed 2023). The application offers visual estimates of the rainfall on the Hawaiian Islands from the present back to 2000 and can display either the monthly or daily average of rainfall. It also offers easily downloadable datasets for anyone wanting to conduct more research.

Images taken from Hawai'i Rainfall Analysis and Mapping Application at Ikewai.com

Image sourced from Drought.gov

I remember, looking out the bus window, the world was gray from smoke, we could barely see the trees on our way out of the state park. Our field trip was cut short, the teacher would not say why. But we were in the middle of a drought, we knew why. The world was on fire, and it burned the midday day sum red.

Drought

On October 7th, 2020, the Board of Water Supply for Honolulu County released an emergency statement declaring the island was experiencing a drought. For five months Oahu had received less than fifty percent of normal average rainfall and showed no signs of letting up. The statement implored the public to take action by reducing the amount of water being used, not letting faucets run, taking shorter showers, not watering the lawn at the hottest parts of the day, and so on.

This, of course, was not the biggest source of distress at the time. It being 2020 and everything with the pandemic going on, this news was easily overshadowed in the public eye. Eventually it did end, though the Board of Water Supply does not offer any other article saying when exactly that was. Though we can look at the Mapping Application maps to see that it had persisted for quite some time.

Images taken from Hawai'i Rainfall Analysis and Mapping Application at Ikewai.com

Drought.gov, a government owned and run website dedicated to collecting drought data across the country and making it easily accessible to the general public. It provides radar maps, which are updated every Thursday and graphs, such as the one previously viewed above, which all track drought within a given state and county. The website defines drought as “a deficiency of precipitation over an extended period of time (usually a season or more), resulting in a water shortage" ("Drought Basics," Accessed 2023). However, it also admits that there are multiple definitions for drought, some literal and others conceptual ("Monitoring Drought", Accessed 2023). It also acknowledges that just as it is difficult to define drought, it is likewise difficult to Monitor it as it is a creeping phenomenon that slowly impacts life and can last from anywhere from months to years.

Image sourced from Drought.gov

In early April the map of Honolulu County from Drought.gov showed the south section of the Windward side of the island was in the D0 stage of drought. Since the heavy rains from the previous month the area is no longer in risk of drought, however it does not erase our concerns for the future. From the graph, we can see that the drought conditions the Board of Water Supply had reported, did in fact persist, then abated, and then came back worse in 2022. It now appears to be stable, but for how long? ("Drought Conditions for Honolulu County," Accessed 2023)

drought map from early April

current drought map, both sourced from Drought.gov

Rain is wild, rain is fierce, it chases off the fires and washes bloody fields. It brings life, it brings nutrition. If it so merrily dances, then I would like to dance with it!

Final Words

The Pō'aihala rain is a friend to the island and its inhabitants. As described earlier, it has helped to carve the groves of He’eia. It is oppressive, and overbearing, but without it we would not have the rich forests with the hala trees or the watershed. The He’eia fishpond would not be able to thrive as it does, and we would be without one of our major sources of water. Its rains are a part of our past, our present, and our future.

Pō'aihala rain, thank you for sharing your gifts with us on the island. For nurturing the land, plants, and animals. For cooling the hot days and filling the sky with beautiful rainbows. Thank you for allowing life to thrive here.

Small spider on web, image taken by website author.

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