Tropical Season 2017

[Ginx snewx]

Rockport is denuded wow

[Typhoon Tip]

I was actually a bit surprised to see Harvey this far inland this morning..

When I crashed last night around midnight ... he was actually impressing as stalled, or virtually so, right over the coast ... just up the way from Corpus' ... This morning he's some 60 miles NNW of there?  But, huh, doing the math...I guess if it was moving at say 6 knots, for 8 to 10 hours - yeah, that makes sense.  The difference is that 6 knots of motion is more likely tougher to detect using convention means, looped rad or satellite etc. 

Anyway, despite the models ... if Harvey stays that far inland over land, he'll be down to a remnant swirl soon enough.  The problem is, a lot of guidance, some dependable ones too, are arguing for it to about-face, moving back to re-emerge out over water.  Hmm. It's presently sitting at a latitude and longitude that is not really precisely matching by any one particular guidance' (that I can find) thoughts on where it would be at this particular time.  So stating the obvious here ...there's some uncertainty as to whether all that will even take place. 

But, what an incredible event!  Just wow -.. I mean, I suspect it is like the Eclipse in some ways.  We read about these things. We listen to the anecdotes. We do our best to appreciate the spectacles and drama of Nature. But until we see ... perhaps most importantly 'feel' them first hand, the vicarious experience can hold no candle to the actual smack of the face. I watched video of people's expressions when at just that last few seconds as the moon circumstance quite literally stuffed breath and suspended vocal sentences.  That exact moment, when the heart churns -

Sitting here in our comfortable chairs, ... whether sliding the frames across our filthy disgusting, unsanitary hand-held interfaces, or moving and clicking the mouse around on PC interfaces, we still cannot truly appreciate what it might have been like if, say ... someone 'rode out the storm' inside the fragile edifice in that image Steve provided above.  God! The walls buckling around you while the deafening whir of white noise so powerful it would lose the back-wash out of a Boeing 747 ... while the roof cleaves off and kites away .. Still, that sort of prosaic imagery means nothing to the person actually huddled in a corner contemplating mortality in a very unique way - to put it mildly.

I read once that there are those in life-long therapy after the Andrew event back in 1992.  That was also a system that hit the coast on the positive slope of development curve.  Seems there is something to that - the timing of such... Systems may be Categorical as the impinge upon the coast, but those in harms way that survive to tell stories of the day seem to necessitate less(more) colorful adjectives in their descriptions, depending on which way tempest was leaning when it came ashore.  Both systems may be RECON'ed with the exact same wind and surface atmospheric pressure, ...the one that is going up, tells the better (or worse ..depending on one's perspective in matters) dystopian story.  Interesting.

 

[dendrite]

"Imagine if this was snow"

[ineedsnow]

Gfs and canadian closer with 92L. Looks ots but would still watch it

[wxeyeNH]

14 hours ago, dendrite said:

Josh is nuts

I follow all of Josh chases.  Met him once at a AMWX conference at BWI. Really nice guy.  I would say with high confidence that he has "cored" more tropical cyclones than anyone else in the world. The past few years he has  been flying over to Asia to catch typhoons.  I keep teasing him about capturing a stadium effect eye.  So hard to do as the eye has to be cleared out and has to be daylight.  Last night he came very close.  If timing had been a couple of hours different the eye would have come on shore during daylight.  I saw in one of his tweets that that after enduring the eyewall the stars came out and the crickets were chirping in the eye.  

[Typhoon Tip]

1 hour ago, dendrite said:

"Imagine if this was snow"

Ha - oh man... Even in the pith of deep tropical agenda, we cannot escape the obsession, huh -

Be that as it may, we are about t-minus ..oh some 28 days away from the GGEM's annual fusion of a -10 C 850 mb air with an actual Category III hurricane somewhere near the Va Capes...  not that you asked of course... But your humor there reminds of that dreaded modeling time of the year. 

Still, how far fetched is it?  When we consider Sandy's indirect relationship to winter storm warning snow even in the cordillera of the W. VA region as it was hooking left into the M/A.  Also, the historical annuals of the eastern seaboard during the Maunder Minimum end years are replete with "suspicious" white-hurricanes... 

[Ginx snewx]

46 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

I follow all of Josh chases.  Met him once at a AMWX conference at BWI. Really nice guy.  I would say with high confidence that he has "cored" more tropical cyclones than anyone else in the world. The past few years he has  been flying over to Asia to catch typhoons.  I keep teasing him about capturing a stadium effect eye.  So hard to do as the eye has to be cleared out and has to be daylight.  Last night he came very close.  If timing had been a couple of hours different the eye would have come on shore during daylight.  I saw in one of his tweets that that after enduring the eyewall the stars came out and the crickets were chirping in the eye.  

Simon Brewer was in the same town and took a lightning shot and got this, wow

[Hoth]

Hypothetically, do we think it's worse from a damage perspective to get hit with a fast moving cat five, or a stalled cat 4 like Harvey? I'd have to think hours of pounding from a strong eye wall could ultimately be as devastating.

[wxeyeNH]

22 minutes ago, Ginx snewx said:

Simon Brewer was in the same town and took a lightning shot and got this, wow

Ginx,  As a photo enthusiast this is an amazing picture.  I have often looked for a picture capturing the circular eyewall from the ground but have never found one.  This is a first.  Crazy!!  Sure there are lots of hurricane hunter pictures but this is the first one ever from the ground.   and the stars is insanely rare.  A once in a million picture!

[40/70 Benchmark]

I feel as though this system was remarkably well behaved.

Glad that my call for 135mph just north of Corpus Cristy worked out for the most part. Means it was a great learning experience.

 

I thought it was clear what was in store as soon as guidance shifted northward Tuesday AM, and I sounded the alarm. Fascinating event, and it was probably tied with Hugo for me....firmly behind Andrew.

[USCAPEWEATHERAF]

Harvey did intensify rapidly up til landfall.  The fact that the models CMC and GFS trended westward with the Irma, I would pay attention to the possibility of some rain on the Cape and gusty winds from the outer bands of future storm Irma

[USCAPEWEATHERAF]

92L has a large circulation at the present, it lacks a well defined center though and is over land.  Models keep it spinning over northern Florida for the next 36-48 hours and then develops once it reaches the ocean east of Hilton Head, SC, this system could begin to rapidly intensify as it near Wilmington, NC and the Outer Banks once it is over the western wall of the Gulf Stream.  Wind shear will be favorable and intensification will be likely.  Also it can become a hybrid and phase with the large upper level low dropping into the Great Lakes and OH Valley and that system could pull Irma into the East Coast landfall.  Some models are as strong as a category one hurricane, so we need to watch this system.

[Mips]

8 hours ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

Has Jeff P posted or tweeted at all this morning?

He was stranded due to flooded roads and limited cell reception as of late enough this morning for the storm to have passed on.   Now he is showing some damage footage in still shots on Twitter.

 

[Typhoon Tip]

I mentioned a couple days ago, too, that a-priori experience with systems of that nature ...it is typical for them to exceed guidance - and estimators who rely upon them.  I was not shocked at all at cat 4 status, either.  Though we did not see an RI sequence as I suspected at the time was plausible - at least that I am aware. 

These things always do this... They are troubled youth that never seem as they'll overcome their surroundings but suddenly, given a favorable environment they over-achieve. In this case, warm oceanic eddy + zippo shear + superb U/A divergent vectors in all quadrants + entering into those variables already in a developmental stride and we're probably lucky this thing didn't go Opal -

[Damage In Tolland]

Sucks that Irma has to go OTS. We can't buy a direct landfalling cane in SNE in this new climate. Really blows 

[Hitman]

11 hours ago, Hoth said:

Totally agree. White knuckle there waiting for the eye. There was another stream of a guy actually driving around in the eyewall. Rain sounded like bullets against the windshield and I actually held my breath as a huge piece of sheet metal flew straight at the camera and over the car at just ludicrous speed.

It was the best hurricane video I've ever seen.  And the comments on the side were pretty funny.  

[ineedsnow]

32 minutes ago, Damage In Tolland said:

Sucks that Irma has to go OTS. We can't buy a direct landfalling cane in SNE in this new climate. Really blows 

I wouldn't give up on it yet 18z models shifted north from 12z... Would probably only be a subtropical storm though if anything

[Damage In Tolland]

47 minutes ago, ineedsnow said:

I wouldn't give up on it yet 18z models shifted north from 12z... Would probably only be a subtropical storm though if anything

Unless that trough digs over the MW nowhere to go but fish 

[TalcottWx]

Houston might be the real story of Harvey, if this rain band stall over that city. Plus the spin ups.

[Hoth]

7 minutes ago, sbos_wx said:

Houston might be the real story of Harvey, if this rain band stall over that city. Plus the spin ups.

That firehose is just insane.

[ice1972]

6 hours ago, Damage In Tolland said:

Unless that trough digs over the MW nowhere to go but fish 

Yup.....need a digging upper trough going neggy over Tennessee-ish to pull that baby north or northwest.....it's thread the needle type stuff

[Typhoon Tip]

I know it's a free country/society and all... but, when the Feds and/or local municipal offices ...etc, cordon off a region and designate it a high-risk/danger zone, imposing mandatory evacuations and all that "omg- go the other way, not actually toward the danger" policy ... two questions leap to mind, one philosophical, the other speculative:

1 .. Shouldn't that be considered a Darwin Award if one of these self-aggrandizing, self-appointed wannabe videographer Natural "journalists" end up wrapped around a telephone pool with their viscera strewn down stream ? Thankfully that did not happen with Harvey..so far.  ...Just think. I bet the local authorities would love cleaning up that person's cadaver who was not even from the region in the first place, too.   Really, just a wonderful added incentive to get out there and get their hands dirty in the arresting aftermath of stranger-than-fiction natural disaster recovery, where so much native life and property that really did have no choice but to weather being blithely disintegrated, needs to all be accounted for. 

2 .. I wonder if 'technically' it is actually illegal to wantonly enter a cordoned off designated high-risk/danger zone. If not now, at some point in future would that ever be enacted? It certainly could.  Real simple: Anyone posting video gawking from within the confines of designated heart-breaking loss zone, will be subjected to enormous fines.  Those ilk of people are not members of the press (formally), as they are not accredited as such.  It should be deemed morally reprehensible (the foundation upon which/why all laws are formulated) to take delight and joy ... entertainment from processes proven injurious to another person/group.

I am not really criticizing the "hurricane chasers" or the earth-quake gawkers, or tornado folks (believe it or not - though there are the usual knee-jerk reactionary pin-heads that will read this that way...)

The observations they make advance science ... at times.  And, it is obviously inhuman to expect any drama of calamity to go unsung; I'm not trying to trump the very human instinct to actually watch the 'exploding fire-works factory.' Ha!  Hell, ever sat in morning grid-lock because of that doom's day scenario of motorist changing a f'n world-ending tire ... Not even in the road, either, but way off out of the way in the shoulder of a highway?  Jesus, people really CAN'T mind their own business.

However, there is a distinction there...  It's just that "while it is happening" thing; the problem is, some are not doing it to 'advance science' and report in the spirit of journalism. They are thrill seekers.  They are doing if for that rush. How do we distinguish between loud noises, flickering lights, the din of the commotion merely turning heads in curiosity, versus those there to get a rush out of it like a sociopath is also completely oblivious how what they are seeing/involved in is affecting others...  Which to me 'sounds' a little like what that is when I hear 'Woo hoo... yeah baby' from some Kansas idiot's pie-hole while he video-tapes a poor family's roof cleave off and kite away from under the relative safety of a hotel's parking garage ...some 500 miles from his/her home. 

 

[Typhoon Tip]

Recent guidance re 92L destiny as a more developed TC or STC did actually include a closer trek up the coast. 

Hmm. With that high pressure sort of anchored E of New England as any would-be 'Irma' is moving NE, that is bit precarious.  The models have to be pretty precise in handling the tandem behavior of both that ridging and the cyclone, because they are modulating at the same time? 

What that means is, initially ..the high would block that NE turn out to sea with the cyclone; however, the models are breaking the high down in just the right timing and fashion to allow said cyclone to bowl thru it.

It may happen that way - in fact ... it probably will.  However, we should keep in mind that ridging over the western Atlantic Basin is notorious for needing P3 special flight ops/sounding mission for a reason. If that ridge is just a little more resistant in timing demise than models suggest, that would tend to force a more coastal track for Irmage -

[Bostonseminole]

The situation in Houston in metro is unreal

[Typhoon Tip]

17 minutes ago, Bostonseminole said:

The situation in Houston in metro is unreal

It really is ... scary ...  All other protestation and descriptions aside, only fear remains.

I read one CEM statement that warned people not to access their attics as a last resort to rising flood water.  I'm like ..are you kidding?!  Would you enter a death trap like that - holy Moses.

Two words for that description:  Darwin Award.  (using that homage twice in as many posts ..heh). Seriously... god.

But, rad estimates are over 20" in a few pixels clear to 30 miles inland in bands....and rad behavior and the big picture of this ordeal do not offer relief any time soon.   At some point here we gotta consider the 1:: ...long-years event ...

I know back in 1979 there was a stalled TC in TX that leveled 40" or more; but this situation beats that in my mind, because that one trekked inland by a considerable larger margin and rained out (so to speak). Where contrasting ...this guy has "feeder-bands" still "connected" to warm ocean...AND, Harvey has indeed resumed a slow motion back toward the Gulf...  As unfathomable as it is, all indicators are that this horror story is just in the first half of the novel -

 

[Damage In Tolland]

There will be some places down there with greater than 80" of rain . Already 35" plus amounts now with 3-5 days more in non stop rains. Starting to wonder if this will challenge US records

[Hoth]

GFS with closest approach of 92L yet. Interesting watching satellite this afternoon east of Jacksonville. (I know, I know: not happening, James)

[Typhoon Tip]

Heh.. .For the time being it remains a sheared mess... There is a bit of a cyclonic motion in general there - lot of work.

Out there in time, there really isn't much hope of that thing getting up here as the model tenor and blends have it now.  If these change...we'll reconvene - otherwise, ur better off consigning the whole thing as fish bate.

[Hoth]

1 hour ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Heh.. .For the time being it remains a sheared mess... There is a bit of a cyclonic motion in general there - lot of work.

Out there in time, there really isn't much hope of that thing getting up here as the model tenor and blends have it now.  If these change...we'll reconvene - otherwise, ur better off consigning the whole thing as fish bate.

Yeah, the sum total of my hopes and dreams is that this can scare up some nice surf for me mid-week.

[ineedsnow]