Storm rainfall brings little relief to Maui’s southside; drought conditions persist

Megan Moseley/ The Maui News photo South Maui is experiencing a severe drought. Recent rainfall from passing storms offered some temporarily relief to the areas of Kihei and Maalaea.
WAILUKU–Leslie Peterson, nursery manager of the South Maui Garden in Kihei, said the recent rainfall that hit Maui last week from storm system Gilma was nothing short of a blessing.
“Down here in the garden, it was a welcomed sight. We were certainly blessed this last evening,” she said the morning of Friday, Aug. 30.
Peterson said the rain came as a relief, as the South Maui area has been experiencing a severe drought as of late.
“A couple weeks ago, I walked out of the nursery and I thought, ‘What is that odd smell?’ Really, I could smell the earth scorching and I was heartbroken. Kihei just had the most drought of all the Hawaiian islands,” she said.
The Hawaii islands faced multiple storm systems last week, Gilma and Hone. These systems weakened as of Thur., Aug. 29, 2024, with no watches or warnings in effect; however, they still brought with them some much-needed rain to Maui’s southside.
David Dorn, a 30-year Kihei resident, outdoorsman and environmentalist, said Kihei can be tricky when it comes to weather–either getting too much or too little rain.
“Kihei tends to get feast of famine. We get extreme rain events when we get the Kona storms, when the wind goes on shore and we get sustained rain events for a couple days. And because of the southern slopes of Haleakala, we get a lot of storm runoff and flooding conditions,” he said.
Last week’s weather; however, did not cause extreme conditions such as previous storms, he said.
“This last rain was good because it wasn’t severe enough to cause those big run offs, just enough to soak in. But we kind of need a few more of these,” he said.
Patrick Blood, meteorologist with the National Weather Service who is based in Honolulu, said the driest part of the island has been in Kihei, along the eastside of Maalaea Bay.
“The strongest drought in the state is going to be right there along the southwestern shores of Maui along Maalaea Bay,” he said.
He said while the area only saw an inch or two of rain last week, it was a “drought buster” and was “more beneficial than anything else.”
He said the island had the potential of seeing a little more rain this past weekend from Hector, formerly a tropical storm, that dissipated early Thursday morning more than 1,000 miles from Hilo, Hawai’i.
However, according to the latest rainfall reports from NWS, Kihei and other parts of the island received no rainfall over the weekend.
To keep up-to-date about weather-related news, you can follow the Maui Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) at https://www.mauicounty.gov/MEMA. For weather information visit https://www.weather.gov/hfo/RRA.