Posted in The weather

The 6th tropical storm of the season, Fabian, is brewing out in the mid Atlantic now, according to the National Hurricane Center. That means time to start getting the hurricane kit prepared. Only a few more months left in hurricane season, but unfortunately, those are the busy months. Hopefully this one doesn't cause too much trouble. We'll see in a few days...

Aside from September 11, much of the discussion around here is centered on where Hurricane Isabel will go. The current forecast path is not encouraging, even though it's still a few days away from any sort of reliable forecast about impact in this area.

According to the National Hurricane Center's 5 AM 12-SEP-2003 discussion,

THE GFDL WHICH HAS BEEN PERFORMING QUITE WELL...TURNS THE HURRICANE MORE TO THE NORTHWEST AND NORTH-NORTHWEST...AND DEPENDING UPON THE RUN YOU PICK...THE TURN OCCURS FARTHER TO THE WEST OR FARTHER TO THE EAST. ON THE OTHER HAND...THE UK MODEL WHICH HAS HAS BEEN MORE CONSISTENT ...MOVES THE HURRICANE FASTER AND BRING ISABEL DANGEROUSLY CLOSE TO THE U.S. COAST IN 5 DAYS. THE GFS WHICH HAS BEEN CHANGING ITS TUNE FROM RUN TO RUN...IS MUCH SLOWER AND IN 5 DAYS PLACES THE HURRICANE ABOUT 450 N MI FROM THE U.S COAST. THE GFS EVENTUALLY BRINGS THE CENTER NEAR THE COAST OF NORTH CAROLINA IN SEVERAL MORE DAYS. FINALLY...THE NOGAPS IS VERY SIMILAR TO THE GFS UP TO 5 DAYS.

In short, I think it's time to start assembling our hurricane kit. Even if it turns out to miss us, it's better to be prepared than to be trying to scramble at the last minute (which everyone else is bound to be doing).

Looks like another hurricane bullet will pass us by. Won't breathe easy until it's gone by and is no longer an issue. But that means it will have impacted someone else. Preparations continue...the season's not over yet.

Ok, it's been a few years now, and I figure I've experienced enough weather here to make up a weather survival guide for any other Canucks who should choose to move here.

General weather: Humid. Days of less than 70% humidity are rare. 90% to 1000% humidity are normal. When you step outside, you'll feel like you're either swimming or drowning. Spring and fall are hot. Summers are even hotter. No need for anything much heaver than a fall jacket.

December/January: Might need the jacket for the mornings. Sweater is fine during the day. Most days are like a cool fall day. Might get below 0C on cooler nights. On very rare occasions, you might even have to scrape the windshield of your car. Don't expect any snow at all. If there is, it will simply be a light dusting that will barely cover the grass. This will however incite people to panic about the weather and make them race out to the stores and stock up on several days worth of provisions. Copious amounts of salt will be spread on the road. The snow wil be gone once the sun hits it. City will remain shut down for the next day or two. On the very rare night that it does snow, it's safer to stay home. Roads will be very icy if there is snow and nobody knows how to drive. Everything will probably have shut down anyway.

February: Starting to warm up a little. Can probably go back to wearing shorts and t-shirts. Those from warmer areas of Canada might want to stick with long pants.

March/April: Ahh, summer's beginning. Break out the shorts and sandals. Don't forget the sunscreen. If you never burned before back home, you will here. If you park your car outside, make sure to buy one of those windshield screens for your car. Go enjoy the beach for the next few months while the days are still tolerable. It's also the rainy season. Keep your umbrella handy.

May: The hot part of summer is beginning. Early mornings and late evenings are still tolerable.

June: It's getting hot outside. Make sure the AC in your house and car is in good working order. Hurricane season starts. Pay attention to the Weather Channel. Did the 1st degree burns on your hands convince you to buy a windshield screen for your car?

July/August: Even hotter now. Glasses fog up going from AC-cooled buildings to the outside. Stepping outside drains all your life energy from you. You feel like collapsing into a steaming puddle of goo. You want to take off more clothes to get cool, but then you'd be naked. And then you'd get suburned. Stay inside where it's cool for the next couple of months. Hurricane season is in full swing. Keep that umbrella handy.

September: Finally starting to cool down. It's safe to go back outside now. Hurricane season is just past the peak, so keep an eye on the weather stations. Feels like late summer for most Canadians.

October: Starting to feel a little bit like late summer/early fall. Decent temperatures again, hurricane season is winding down. You can enjoy being outside once again. Don't expect to see leaves changing colour. They just turn brown and fall off the trees.

November: Might need to break out the sweater now. Weather is most like mid fall.

We're into the last half of May now, and that means Hurrican Season is coming soon and the National Hurricane Center's hurricane predictions are in.

This year's storm names:
Alex, Bonnie Charley, Danielle, Earl, Frances, Gaston, Hermine, Ivan, Jeanne, Karl, Lisa, Matthew, Nicole, Otto, Paula, Richard, Shary, Tomas, Virginie, Walter.

Some highlights from the NHC's predictions:

The outlook calls for 12-15 tropical storms, with 6-8 becoming hurricanes, and 2-4 of these becoming major hurricanes. These numbers reflect a predicted ACE index in the range of 100%-160% of the median, and indicate a likely continuation of above-normal activity that began in 1995.

Many of the tropical storms and hurricanes in 2004 are likely to form during August-October over the tropical Atlantic and Caribbean Sea between 9°N-21.5°N (green box). These systems generally track westward toward the United States and Caribbean Sea as they strengthen.

Another factor known to significantly impact seasonal Atlantic hurricane activity is ENSO (Gray 1984, Monthly Weather Review), with El Niño favoring reduced activity and La Niña favoring increased activity. Based on the most recent ENSO outlook issued by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center, ENSO-neutral conditions are expected to continue in the tropical Pacific through July, and most likely through August-October as well. However, there is considerable uncertainty in the statistical and coupled model ENSO forecasts after July, and the comparatively wide range in the predicted ACE values reflects this uncertainty.

There are two competing uncertainties in this outlook. The first is the possibility of an extremely active season similar to 2003, which resulted partly from near-record warmth across the deep tropical Atlantic, and partly from an amplified upper-level ridge across the western subtropical Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico in association with a persistent East Atlantic teleconnection pattern (Bell et al. 2004, Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., In press). In the event that the warmer tropical Atlantic SSTs and the subtropical ridge over the western Atlantic again become significantly enhanced, the ACE values could be at or even above the high end of the predicted range.

The second uncertainty involves the ENSO forecasts, which have exhibited low skill historically when issued at this time of the year and represent an ongoing source of uncertainty in the pre-season hurricane outlooks. There is currently considerably diversity in the statistical and coupled model forecasts of ENSO after July, which leads to a wider predicted ACE range in this outlook.

There are days where I wonder how the heck I ended up here. Why am I in a place where a cool summer morning is the same as a blazing hot summer day back home? Where the mornings start off at 25°C, which would be a scorching day back home. And it only gets worse from there as the day goes on. This is only the beginning of the hot season too.

Ok, so while I was blissfully out of touch last week apparently tropical storm (now hurricane) Alex popped up right off the coast of South Carolina. No doubt the cause of my flight delays on Sunday. Fortunately it had minimal impact on South Carolina aside from making it a good weekend for surfers off Folly Beach and not much significant impact for the affected bits of North Carolina.

Next!

Gee, I wasn't expecting that next one to come quite so soon, but there it is, Tropical Depression 2 forming in the mid-Atlantic. According to the NHC's first discussion,

THE DEPRESSION IS MOVING WESTWARD OR 280 DEGREES AT 18 KNOTS...
STEERED BY THE WINDS SOUTH OF THE SUBTROPICAL RIDGE. HOWEVER...
LARGE SCALE MODELS FORECAST A LARGE TROUGH OVER THE EASTERN COAST
OF THE UNITED STATES. THIS TROUGH WILL ERODE THE SUBTROPICAL RIDGE
FORCING THE CYCLONE TO TURN MORE TO NORTHWEST AND NORTH DURING THE
LAST PORTION OF THE FORECAST.

Oh sweet, NHC does RSS feeds now!

And then there were two. There is Bonnie, which I don't expect to have much impact here except for making it a rainy end of the week. The 11 AM 10-Aug-04 NHC discussion says

A SECOND AND STRONGER SHORTWAVE TROUGH IS FORECAST TO MOVE INTO THE
WESTERN AND CENTRAL GULF OF MEXICO. THE INCREASING SOUTHWESTERLY
FLOW AHEAD OF THAT TROUGH SHOULD ACT TO ACCELERATE BONNIE TO THE
NORTHEAST WITH LANDFALL OCCURRING IN THE FLORIDA PANHANDLE IN 48-60
HOURS. THE OFFICIAL FORECAST TRACK IS JUST AN EXTENSION OF THE
PREVIOUS TRACK THROUGH 36 HOURS...AND THEN FASTER AND TO THE RIGHT
AFTER THAT. A 96-HOUR POSITION WAS ADDED FOR CONTINUITY SINCE THE
BONNIE CIRCULATION MAY BECOME A SIGNIFICANT EXTRATROPICAL LOW CLOSE
TO THE U.S. EAST COAST AFTER 72 HOURS.

And then there's Charley (I keep wanting to say Clyde). This might end up being a double whammy for those eastern Gulf coast states, particularly Florida.

Definitely time to make sure the hurricane kit is up-to-date.

Ok, it's not a really big smackdown. At least not yet. I hope it isn't anyway. Maybe a slap upside the head or a smack on the wrist.

Just in case we'd gotten complacent over the past few years, Bonnie and Charley are our little reminder that yes, this is hurricane season, and just because it's been quiet the past few years doesn't mean it'll stay that way.

The current track for Bonnie has it going through the western part of SC and will probably bring heavy rain and winds. Charley on the other hand will come much closer to Charleston, and I think we'll be in for a rainy and windy weekend.

Number 4 you're up to bat! Fresh from the NHC is news about Tropical Depression 4 getting warmed up in the eastern Atlantic.

AT 11 AM AST...1500Z...THE CENTER OF TROPICAL DEPRESSION FOUR WAS LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 12.2 NORTH...LONGITUDE 22.7 WEST OR ABOUT 275 MILES... 445 KM...SOUTH-SOUTHEAST OF THE CAPE VERDE ISLANDS. THE DEPRESSION IS MOVING TOWARD THE WEST NEAR 14 MPH...22 KM/HR... AND THIS GENERAL MOTION IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE FOR THE NEXT 24 HOURS MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS ARE NEAR 35 MPH... 55 KM/HR...WITH HIGHER GUSTS. SOME STRENGTHENING IS FORECAST DURING THE NEXT 24 HOURS... AND THE DEPRESSION COULD BECOME A TROPICAL STORM LATER TODAY OR TONIGHT.

This one will definitely require some watching for those on the East coast.

TD4 has started warming up and we now have TD5 gearing up in the same area that sprouted Charley. If this keeps up I'll need to develop chameleon eyes to keep track of all this activity.

Sometime tomorrow morning Charley will be brushing uncomfortably close to Charleston on it's way to another landfall in the Georgetown area. Hopefully there is no additional strengthening when it's over the Atlantic after it leaves Florida

Charley is passing by just off the coast as I write this. Last report had it about 50 miles or so just southeast of Charleston. It's been pretty windy and rainy for the past few hours, but that's about it. Heavy rain bands that passed by us a little while ago are hitting the Mt. Pleasant area and areas further north. I expect the worst of the rain will be over fairly soon, and the wind will die down in the next hour or two.

Then it will be time to keep an eye on TD5. NHC has it turning into a tropical storm later on this weekend, perhaps by tomorrow, in which case we'll have Tropical Storm Earl to keep tabs on.

In the meantime, TD 4 has turned into Tropical Storm Danielle overnight. Looks like Danielle will probably stay out in the Atlantic and not affect any land though.

Frances became hurricane #4 earlier today. This one will need some watching over the next few days to see where it decides to go.

They're popping like mushrooms after a heavy rain! Big Hurricane Frances still in the mid Atlantic, and now there is Tropical Storm Gaston that popped up off the coast. Fortunately Gaston looks like it won't bring much more than a lot of rain as it wanders over top of us.

We weathered Gaston pretty well. The wind got pretty howly and saw some branches fall from the trees outside one of our windows. Lots of water and blown down foliage on the roads yesterday and flooding in all the usual places. We ended up losing power twice yesterday, but not for very long.

• Back up the computer
• Collect all the things to take with us
• Secure the apartment
• Top up the hurricane kit
• Gas up the car
• Get some cash
• Find a place to evacuate to

Where we evacuate to will depend largely on where Frances decides to go. During Hurricane Floyd back in 1999, we took off to Atlanta (had to go there anyway). The wife says we should go there again this time. But if Frances goes inland and turns to follow the coast, then Atlanta might not be such a good choice.

Looks like Frances is going to be taking a bead towards central Florida, although I won't feel like we're out of the woods yet for a couple more days. We had planned to evacuate out to Atlanta for the weekend, but now it seems that will probably be a bit too early.

From the 11 AM 1-SEP-04 NHC discussion:

THE SUBTROPICAL RIDGE CONTROLLING THE MOTION OF FRANCES IS FORECAST TO PERSIST BUT TO WEAKEN. THIS WOULD ALLOW THE HURRICANE TO TURN MORE TO THE WEST-NORTHWEST AND NORTHWEST WITH A DECREASE IN FORWARD SPEED. THE OFFICIAL FORECAST IS VERY SIMILAR TO THE PREVIOUS ONE...AND BASICALLY FOLLOWS THE GLOBAL MODEL CONSENSUS. THE OFFICIAL FORECAST BRINGS THE CORE OF THE HURRICANE NEAR THE FLORIDA EAST COAST WITHIN 3 DAYS.

Yesterday a couple of local radio guys were joking about how if Jim Cantore from the Weathr Channel showed up on Folly Beach, then it's time to get out. He always seems to go where the weather is going to be the worst. But if Mike Seidel showed up, then it was probably OK.

The latest 11 AM discussion from the NHC makes a Florida landfall in a couple of days more probable The wife has a notion that Frances will decide to skirt the coast, so our preparations continue.

From the NOAA Environmental Visualization Program (via today's APOD) is a very cool photograph of Frances taken yesterday morning by the GOES-12 satellite. It shows very impressively just how big the Frances really is.

And on the heels of Frances comes TS Ivan, which so far looks to be taking a more westward track than Frances did. This will be yet another one for people to watch and keep an eye on.