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Hawaii
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hawaii (
i/həˈwaɪ.iː/ or /həˈwaɪʔiː/; Hawaiian: Hawaiʻi Hawaiian pronunciation: [hɐˈvɐiʔi]) is the most recent of the 50 U.S. states (August 21, 1959), and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean.
i/həˈwaɪ.iː/ or /həˈwaɪʔiː/; Hawaiian: Hawaiʻi Hawaiian pronunciation: [hɐˈvɐiʔi]) is the most recent of the 50 U.S. states (August 21, 1959), and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean.
Hawaii’s diverse natural scenery, warm tropical climate, abundance of public beaches and oceanic surrounding, and active volcanoes make it a popular destination for tourists, surfers, biologists, and volcanologists alike. Due to its mid-Pacific location, Hawaii has many North American and Asian influences along with its own vibrant native culture. Hawaii has over a million permanent residents along with many visitors and U.S. military personnel. Its capital is Honolulu on the island of Oʻahu.
The state encompasses nearly the entire volcanic Hawaiian Island chain, which comprises hundreds of islands spread over 1,500 miles (2,400 km). At the southeastern end of the archipelago, the eight "main islands" are (from the northwest to southeast) Niʻihau, Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Kahoʻolawe, Maui, and the island of Hawaiʻi. The last is by far the largest and is often called "The Big Island" to avoid confusion with the state as a whole. The archipelago is physiographically and ethnologically part of the Polynesian subregion of Oceania.
Hawaii is the 8th-least extensive, the 11th-least populous, but the 13th-most densely populated of the 50 U.S. states. Hawaii's coastline is approximately 750 miles (1,210 km) long, which is fourth in the United States after Alaska, Florida, and California.
Hawaii
Etymology
The Hawaiian language word Hawaiʻi derives from Proto-Polynesian *Sawaiki, with the reconstructed meaning "homeland";[7] Hawaiʻicognates are found in other Polynesian languages, including Māori (Hawaiki), Rarotongan (ʻAvaiki), and Samoan (Savaiʻi). (See alsoHawaiki).
According to Pukui and Elbert,[8] "Elsewhere in Polynesia, Hawaiʻi or a cognate is the name of the underworld or of the ancestral home, but in Hawaiʻi, the name has no meaning."[9]
Spelling of state name
A somewhat divisive political issue arose when the constitution of the state of Hawaii added Hawaiian as a second official state language: the exact spelling of the state's name, which in the islands' language is Hawai'i (the apostrophe marking a Hawaiian consonant, a cut-off of breath before the final i). In the Hawaii Admission Act that granted Hawaiian statehood, the federal government recognized Hawaii to be the official state name. Official government publications, as well as department and office titles, use the traditional Hawaiian spelling, with no symbols for glottal stops or vowel length.[10] In contrast, some private entities, including a local newspaper, do use such symbols.
The title of the state constitution is "The Constitution of the State of Hawaii". In Article XV, Section 1 uses "The State of Hawaii", Section 2 "the island of Oahu", Section 3 "The Hawaiian flag", and Section 5 specifies the state motto as "Ua mau ke ea o ka aina i ka pono". Since these documents predate the modern use of the ʻokina and the kahakō in Hawaiian orthography, the diacritics were not used.
Geography and environment
Main article: Hawaiian Islands
The main Hawaiian Islands are:
| Island | Nickname | Location | Area | Highest point | Elevation | Population (as of 2010) | Density | Age (Ma)[11] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hawaiʻi[12] | The Big Island | 19°34′N155°30′W | 4,028.0 sq mi (10,432.5 km2) | Mauna Kea | 13,796 ft (4,205 m) | 185,079 | 45.948/sq mi (17.7407/km2) | 0.4 |
| Kauaʻi[13] | The Garden Isle | 22°05′N159°30′W | 552.3 sq mi (1,430.5 km2) | Kawaikini | 5,243 ft (1,598 m) | 66,921 | 121.168/sq mi (46.783/km2) | 5.1 |
| Kahoʻolawe[14] | The Target Isle | 20°33′N156°36′W | 44.6 sq mi (115.5 km2) | Puʻu Moaulanui | 1,483 ft (452 m) | 0 | 0 | 1.0 |
| Lānaʻi[15] | The Pineapple Isle | 20°50′N156°56′W | 140.5 sq mi (363.9 km2) | Lānaʻihale | 3,366 ft (1,026 m) | 3,135 | 22.313/sq mi (8.615/km2) | 1.3 |
| Maui[16] | The Valley Isle | 20°48′N156°20′W | 727.2 sq mi (1,883.4 km2) | Haleakalā | 10,023 ft (3,055 m) | 144,444 | 198.630/sq mi (76.692/km2) | 1.3-0.8 |
| Molokaʻi[17] | The Friendly Isle | 21°08′N157°02′W | 260.0 sq mi (673.4 km2) | Kamakou | 4,961 ft (1,512 m) | 7,345 | 28.250/sq mi (10.9074/km2) | 1.9-1.8 |
| Niʻihau[18] | The Forbidden Isle | 21°54′N160°10′W | 69.5 sq mi (180.0 km2) | Mount Pānīʻau | 1,250 ft (381 m) | 170 | 2.45/sq mi (0.944/km2) | 4.9 |
| Oʻahu[19] | The Gathering Place | 21°28′N157°59′W | 596.7 sq mi (1,545.4 km2) | Mount Kaʻala | 4,003 ft (1,220 m) | 953,207 | 1,597.46/sq mi (616.78/km2) | 3.7-2.6 |
Topography
An archipelago situated some 2,000 mi (3,200 km)southwest of the North American mainland,[21] Hawaii is the southernmost state of the United States and the second westernmost state after Alaska. Only Hawaii and Alaska do not share a border with another U.S. state.
Hawaii is the only state of the United States that is not geographically located in North America, grows coffee, is completely surrounded by water, is entirely an archipelago, has royal palaces, and does not have a straight line in its state boundary.
Hawaii’s tallest mountain, Mauna Kea, stands at 13,796 ft(4,205 m)[22] but is taller than Mount Everest if followed to the base of the mountain, which, lying at the floor of the Pacific Ocean, rises about 33,500 ft(10,200 m).[23]
The eight main islands, Hawaiʻi, Maui, Oʻahu, Kahoʻolawe, Lanaʻi, Molokaʻi, Kauaʻi and Niʻihau are accompanied by many others. Kaʻala is a small island near Niʻihau that is often overlooked. The Northwest Hawaiian Islands are a series of nine small, older masses northwest of Kauaʻi that extend from Nihoa to Kure that are remnants of once much larger volcanic mountains. There are also more than 100 small rocks and islets, such as Molokini, that are either volcanic, marine sedimentary or erosional in origin, totaling 130 or so across the archipelago.[24]
Geology
All the Hawaiian islands were formed from volcanic activity initiated at an undersea magma source called a hotspot. As the tectonic plate beneath much of the Pacific Ocean moves to the northwest, the hot spot remains stationary, slowly creating new volcanoes. Due to the hotspot’s location, the only active volcanoes are located around the southern half of the Big Island. The newest volcano, Lōʻihi Seamount, is located south of the Big Island’s coast.
The last volcanic eruption outside the Big Island occurred at Haleakalā on Maui before the late 18th century, though it could have been hundreds of years earlier.[25] In 1790, Kīlauea exploded with the deadliest eruption (of the modern era) known to have occurred in what is now the United States.[26] As many as 5,405 warriors and their families marching on Kīlaueawere killed by that eruption.[27]
Volcanic activity and subsequent erosion have created impressive geological features. The Big Island has the third highest point among the world’s islands.[28]
Slope instability of the volcanoes has generated damaging earthquakes with relatedtsunamis, particularly in 1868 and 1975.[29] Steep cliffs have been caused by catastrophic debris avalanches on the submerged flanks of ocean island volcanos.[30][31]
Flora and fauna
Because the islands are so far from other land habitats, life before human activity is said to have arrived by the “3 W’s”: wind (carried through the air), waves (brought by ocean currents), and wings (birds, insects, and whatever they brought with them). This isolation, and the wide range of environments (extreme altitude, tropical climate) produced a vast array of endemic flora and fauna (see Endemism in the Hawaiian Islands). Hawaii has more endangered species and has lost a higher percentage of its endemic species than any other U.S. state.[32]
Protected areas
Several areas in Hawaii are under the protection of the National Park Service.[33] Hawaii has two national parks: Haleakala National Park near Kula, on Maui, includes Haleakalā, the dormant volcano that formed east Maui; and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in the southeast region of the island of Hawaiʻi, which includes the active volcano Kīlauea and its various rift zones.
There are three national historical parks: Kalaupapa National Historical Park in Kalaupapa, Molokaʻi, the site of a former Hansen’s disease colony; Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park in Kailua-Kona on the island of Hawaiʻi; and Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park, an ancient place of refuge. Other areas under the control of the National Park Service include Ala Kahakai National Historic Trail on the Big Island and the USS Arizona Memorialat Pearl Harbor on Oʻahu.
The Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument was proclaimed by President George W. Bush on June 15, 2006. The monument covers roughly 140,000 square miles (360,000 km2) of reefs, atolls and shallow and deep sea out to 50 miles (80 km) offshore in the Pacific Ocean, larger than all of America’s National Parks combined.[34]
Climate
See also: List of Hawaii tornadoes and Environment of Hawaii
Hawaii’s climate is typical for the tropics, although temperatures and humidity tend to be a bit less extreme due to near-constant trade winds from the east. Summer highs are usually in the upper 80s °F, (around 31 °C) during the day and mid 70s, (around 24 °C) at night. Winter day temperatures are usually in the low to mid 80s, (around 28 °C) and (at low elevation) seldom dipping below the mid 60s (18 °C) at night. Snow, not usually associated with the tropics, falls at 4,205 metres (13,796 ft) on Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa on the Big Island in some winter months. Snow rarely falls on Haleakala. Mount Waiʻaleʻale, on Kauaʻi, has the second highest average annual rainfall on Earth, about 460 inches (11.7 m). Most of Hawaii has only two seasons: the dry season from May to October, and the wet season from October to April.[35]
The warmest temperature recorded in the state is 100°F (making it tied with Alaska as the lowest high temperature recorded in a U.S. state) in Pahala on April 27, 1931. Hawaii's all-time record low temperature is 12°F observed in May 1979 on the summit of Mauna Kea. Hawaii is the only state to have never recorded sub-zero Fahrenheit temperatures.
Local climates vary considerably on each island, grossly divisible into windward (Koʻolau) and leeward (Kona) areas based upon location relative to the higher mountains. Windward sides face cloud cover, so resorts concentrate on sunny leeward coasts
Feature Presentation: Just Push Playhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada%E2%80%93France%E2%80%93Hawaii_Telescope
Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope is located near the summit of Mauna Keamountain on Hawaii's Big Island at an altitude of 4,204 meters (13,793 feet), and is one of the observatories that comprise the Mauna Kea Observatory. Operational since 1979,[1] the telescope is a Prime Focus/Cassegrain configuration with a usable aperture diameter of 3.58 meters.
CFHT hosts three state-of-the-art instruments: MegaPrime, a wide-field high resolution CCD mosaic of 36 CCDs and 340 MegaPixels; WIRCam, an infra-red mosaic of 4 detectors and 16 MegaPixels optimized for the J, H, and K spectral bands[2]; and ESPaDOnS, a new échelle spectrograph / spectropolarimeter. PUEO, an adaptive optics bonette, is still offered to users, while Gecko, a very high resolution spectrograph, and MOS, the Multi Object Spectrograph, can be used on special request only.
CFHT, in collaboration with Coelum Astronomia, maintains a public-outreach website called "Hawaiian Starlight" which offers extremely high-quality versions of CFHT images in various formats including a yearly calendar.
The corporation is bound by a tri-partite agreement between the University of Hawaii and the governments of France and Canada. Additional funding for WIRCam came from Korea and Taiwan.
Currently, CFHT observing time is offered to scientists from Canada, France and the State of Hawaii, the three funding partners. Astronomers from the European Union can also submit proposals through the Opticon Access program. An agreement between the Academia Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics and CFHT opens the telescope to the Taiwanese astronomical community up to the end of 2010.
Future instrumentation planned for CFHT include SITELLE, a Fourier transform spectrograph, and SPIRou, a near-infrared spectropolarimeter. Conceptual development is also underway for IMAKA, a wide-field optical imaging camera that incorporates ground layer adaptive optics.
The telescope is being used to conduct the Pan-Andromeda Archaeological Survey (PAndAS), a large-scale astronomical survey of theAndromeda Galaxy (M31) and the Triangulum Galaxy (M33). The project involves members of the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics.
On top of Mauna Kea on Hawaii there is a whole community of telescopes
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/11/oldest-galaxy-hawaii-telescope-astronomers_n_1587834.html
Oldest Galaxy Spotted From Hawaii Telescopes, Astronomers Say
HONOLULU -- A team of Japanese astronomers using telescopes on Hawaii say they've seen the oldest galaxy, a discovery that's competing with other "earliest galaxy" claims.
The Japanese team calculates its galaxy was formed 12.91 billion light-years ago, and their research will be published in the Astrophysical Journal. The scientists with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan used the Subaru and Keck telescopes on the summit of Mauna Kea.
A light-year is the distance that light travels in a year, about 6 trillion miles. Seeing distant galaxies is akin to looking back into time.
Richard Ellis of the California Institute of Technology, an influential expert in cosmology and galaxy formation, said the latest work as more convincing than some other galaxy discoveries.
He said the Japanese claim is more "watertight," using methods that everyone can agree on. But he said it's not much of a change from a similar finding by the same team last year.
Still, "it's the most distant bullet-proof one that everybody believes," Ellis said.
In 2010, a French team using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope claimed to have discovered a galaxy from 13.1 billion light-years ago and last year a California team using Hubble said they saw a galaxy from 13.2 billion light-years ago. Both Hubble teams published findings in the journal Nature.
However, the two Hubble teams have yet to confirm their findings with other methods, said Ellis. Also, a team of Arizona State University astronomers this month claimed to have found a galaxy from 13 billion light-years away. They used a telescope in Chile.
Current theory holds that the universe was born of an explosion, called the Big Bang, about 13.7 billion years ago. So astronomers using the most powerful telescopes available are peering deeper and deeper into that dawn of the universe.
Color composite image of the Subaru XMM-Newton Deep Survey Field. The red galaxy at the center of the image is the most distant galaxy, SXDF-NB1006-2.
From Google+
'Oldest galaxy' discovered using Hawaii telescope
Japanese astronomers on Hawaii say they have found a galaxy 12.91bn light years away
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The Hawaii observatory on Mauna Kea. Photograph: Roger Ressmeyer/Corbis
A team of Japanese astronomers using telescopes on Hawaii say they have seen the oldest galaxy yet discovered.
The team calculates that the galaxy is 12.91bn light years away, and their research will be published in the Astrophysical Journal. The scientists with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan used the Subaru and Keck telescopes on the summit of Mauna Kea.
A light year is the distance that light travels in a year, about 6 trillion miles (9.66 trillion kilometres). Seeing distant galaxies is in effect looking back in time.
Richard Ellis of the California Institute of Technology, an influential expert in cosmology and galaxy formation, said the latest work was more convincing than some other claims of early galaxies.
He said the Japanese claim was more "watertight", using methods that everyone can agree on. But he said it was not much of a change from a similar finding by the same team last year.
"It's the most distant bullet-proof one that everybody believes," Ellis said.
In 2010, a French team using Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope claimed to have discovered a galaxy 13.1bn light years away and last year a California team using Hubble said it had seen a galaxy 13.2bn light years away. Both Hubble teams published findings in the journal Nature.
However, the two Hubble teams have yet to confirm their findings with other methods, said Ellis. A team of Arizona State University astronomers this month claimed to have found a galaxy 13bn light years away using a telescope in Chile.
Current theory holds that the universe was born of an explosion, called the Big Bang, about 13.7bn years ago. Astronomers using the most powerful telescopes available are peering deeper and deeper into that dawn of the universe.
• This article was amended on 12 June 2012 to change references to "light years ago" to "light years away". Just Push Play!
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The Nene is the official state bird of Hawaii.
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