Hurricane Douglas Brushed Hawaii; Closest Hurricane to Oahu in At Least 61 Years

Douglas first became a tropical depression on July 20 over 900 miles southwest of Los Cabos, Mexico. Two days later, Douglas became the first hurricane of the 2020 Eastern Pacific Hurricane season, one of the latest-forming first hurricanes in that basin in the satellite era - since the late 1960s - as noted by UNC-Charlotte graduate student Eric Webb.

The hurricane peaked at Category 4 intensity on July 23.

Close Call

But unlike a number of other Eastern Pacific hurricanes, Douglas didn't lose its intensity that quickly as it tracked toward Hawaii. Increased wind shear and less warm water wasn't enough to spin it down faster.

As a result, this prompted hurricane warnings for Maui, Oahu and Kauai.

The southern eyewall of Douglas tracked just north of Maui, Oahu and Kauai, sparing those islands from seeing the worst of the hurricane's strong winds and heavy rainfall.

In the case of Oahu, the hurricane's center passed just 30 miles north of the northern tip of Oahu on July 26.

According to a preliminary storm summary released Monday from the National Weather Service, Douglas was the closest hurricane to Oahu since at least 1959, when Hurricane Dot came within 60 miles of the western coast of Oahu.

Douglas' wind gusts did down some tree and produced bands of locally flooding rain in parts of the islands as it brushed by.

Most areas of the Big Island, Maui County, Oahu and Kauai picked up 1 to 3 inches of rain from Douglas. Isolated wind gusts above 55 mph were clocked in a few areas, but, for the most part, gusts remained from 30 to 50 mph.

Overall, the impacts were fairly benign, compared to other recent hurricane brushes, including the record-setting rain event from Lane in 2018.

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