The story starts in the tropics, where direct sunlight evaporates sea water and easterly winds north and south of the equator converge, creating a belt of moisture. In fact, the Pineapple Express is just one example of an atmospheric river. A huge swell on the North Shore, which last week led to a spate of rescues and exhilaration for surfers, resulted from the storm track to the north that eventually slammed into California.Ĭalifornians have long used the term Pineapple Express to describe the winter storms that can bring welcome precipitation or, if they’re particularly strong or stall out or come in a series, widespread damage and misery. There’s other evidence of the connection. It also suppressed the vertical formation of clouds that could have led to rain. The storm track headed to California in recent weeks pushed the ridge of high pressure that usually stays north of Hawaii directly over the islands. In October 2021, a powerful storm off the Pacific Northwest coast steered an intense atmospheric river into San Francisco. In fact, the contrast is evidence of how the two places are connected meteorologically. Oddly, even as California copes with a seemingly endless parade of “atmospheric rivers,” Hawaii has been unusually calm and dry. Here at the starting point of “the Pineapple Express,” it’s a little hard to imagine being at one end of a 2,500-mile ribbon of moisture that in California fills rivers to overflowing, triggers mudslides and breaches levees.Īnd yet, it’s right there on satellite maps: sometimes originating right over Hawaii, sometimes as much as hundreds of miles to the north, pointed like a dagger at the West Coast.
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