(Bloomberg) — Pacific storm Lala strengthened into a hurricane as it edged closer to Hawaii\u2019s Big Island, where it will make possible landfall on Saturday, the US National Hurricane Center said.<\/p>\n
Lala\u2019s top winds reached 75 miles (121 kilometers) per hour, up from 65 mph earlier, as it closed to within 85 miles of South Point, Hawaii, the center said in an advisory. The Category 1 hurricane was already raking the island chain with stiff winds and rain Saturday morning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHurricane conditions expected later today\u201d on the Big Island of Hawaii, \u00a0Robbie Berg, a warning coordination meteorologist at the center, wrote in his forecast. \u00a0<\/p>\n
If Lala maintains its strength and strikes as a hurricane, it will be the first storm to hit the islands with that power since 1992.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet the recent past shows even close calls can bring devastating floods \u2014 and worse \u2014 to the 50th US state. In 2023, Hurricane Dora passed far to the south, but helped set up wind patterns that fanned flames across Maui, where fires raged out of control and killed more than 100 people.<\/p>\n
As much as 20 inches (51 centimeters) of rain may fall across the Big Island, with isolated spots getting 25 inches, according to the center Elsewhere, as much as 1 foot may fall on eastern Maui and between 4 and 6 inches across the rest of the chain.\u00a0<\/p>\n
There were 111 flights into and out of Honolulu and Hilo canceled as of 2:30 p.m. in New York, according to FlightAware.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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