Hawaii Braces For Direct Tropical Storm Hit On Big Island

Hawaii’s Big Island is under a hurricane warning as Tropical Storm Lala is expected to make landfall on Saturday local time, according to the National Hurricane Center.

“This is a very serious storm,” Hawaii Gov. Josh Green told reporters late Friday night. “We have not had a hurricane make landfall in quite some time. So none of us really have experienced this really in, you know, the last couple of decades.”

Friday August 14, 2026, 10:10 PM: Lala is about to become a full-fledged hurricane and hit the southern end of the Big Island of Hawaii, with rainfall amounts of 12.5 to 27 inches by Saturday at 9 PM. The storm is expected to rapidly strengthen in the next 6 to 12 hours to a… pic.twitter.com/Ig3FMFIbKs

— Jason D Farhang (@jason61987) August 15, 2026

Green said Hawaii will see “an incredible amount of water,” warning residents and visitors to prepare for extremely heavy rain and widespread flooding, as well as the possibility of major power outages.

“We’re hoping that it’s going to be sufficiently far south that we just get the periphery of the storm, but, no promises, we’ve seen storms turn,” Green said.

As of 0800 local time, the NHC said Tropical Storm Lala was roughly 140 miles southeast of South Point, Hawaii, packing sustained winds of 65 mph and moving west-northwest at 13 mph.

The FOX Forecast Center warns that “30 inches of torrential rain could deluge higher terrain and favored windward slopes, triggering widespread, life-threatening flash flooding and severe mudslides.”

Big Island of Hawaii is gonna get it… #Lala barreling.. certain chance (purple) of Tropical-Storm-Force winds pic.twitter.com/Z7quHJptX7

— Mike Zaccardi, CFA, CMT 🍖 (@MikeZaccardi) August 15, 2026

The last hurricane to make landfall in Hawaii …

… was Category 4 Hurricane Iniki in 1992.