Official National Hurricane Center Forecast for Tomas, credit: NOAA/NHC
Just a quick update here. Tomas basically fell apart earlier today, with maximum sustained winds plummeting to 45 mph. However, if you look at a satellite loop of Tomas, you’ll see that thunderstorms re-flared up this afternoon. The take home from this is that Tomas still has its inner workings in place, and once shear relaxes, Tomas should be back in the game of intensification. You can see the official forecast to the left from the National Hurricane Center. Obviously, again, this looks primed to hit Haiti hard…be it a dangerous hurricane or heavy rain. There are a couple outlier models taking Tomas into either eastern Cuba or Jamaica, but the majority are clustered entirely over Haiti. So I’ll have more on this tomorrow probably.
End of Week Storm
The models shifted a bit today…further east and more disjointed. The Euro, which had been showing a large storm, has surprisingly trended toward the GFS model and is now showing a more strung out area of precipitation, less deep of a storm, and less interesting of a storm. Still could see some snowflakes in the air from the Appalachians up into New York, but this wouldn’t be a major storm, except a decent one in far Northern New England and Quebec, with rain ending as a little wet snow. But the Euro does bring in a second system into Sunday and Monday, with a setup that would favor lake enhanced snow in New York. So I’m not sold right now on any particular solution, as there appears to be a lot of additional uncertainty, both with the progress and breakdown of the ridge in the West, and the large amount of moisture likely to be present out of the Gulf and in the East. Stay tuned on this one.
Also from the Capital Weather Gang, Wes Junker, one of the sharpest meteorologists you’ll ever find, is beginning a two part series on why last winter was such a record buster in the Mid-Atlantic. Well worth a read if you’re in the DC/Baltimore area or just like snow.
Photography Sauli Koski in Finland, hit the atmospheric optics grand slam, when he caught no less than 13 different optical phenomena!! Amazing picture here, and more on spaceweather.com.
Wind shear and 24 hour change in the Atlantic Basin, credit: University of Wisconsin CIMMS
Tomas continues along in the Caribbean today, about 265 miles west of St. Lucia, chugging off slightly north of due west around 10 mph. Tomas bumped up to a Cat 2 storm overnight, but has since weakened, back to a minimal 75 mph category one storm. Reconnaissance aircraft visited the storm earlier and helped quantify what satellite had been showing all day. It looks pretty ragged, as some dry air and shear have begun to take their toll on Tomas. You can see the ragged structure of Tomas here. The darker area to the west of the storm indicates the presence of at least some drier air too. The image to the left shows the current wind shear analysis in the Atlantic, as well as the trend. The red area near the hurricane symbol indicates that Tomas is in an area of enhanced shear. Assuming things gradually progress from west to east, it would appear things are only going to get more hostile for Tomas the next day or so. In fact, the model guidance suggests that the shear remains over Tomas into Tuesday, before pulling away. Provided Tomas can maintain its core and overall structure, even if it weakens into, say, a tropical storm, it will have an opportunity later Tuesday and through Wednesday to intensify, and given the water temperatures in that region, it could be explosive strengthening if the conditions are right.
In terms of the track of Tomas, while things may change some in the next day or two as the storm fluctuates in intensity,
Morning Model Guidance Spaghetti Plot of Tomas' Tracks, credit: South Florida Water Management District
you can see that most of the models track Tomas to just south of Hispaniola. After that, they generally either stall or it lift it northward. In reality, given the normal uncertainty of tropical systems, anything is possible, from Cuba to east of the Dominican Republica. Unfortunately though, Haiti looks to be right in the middle of the possibilities. And again, unfortunately, regardless of the intensity of Tomas at landfall, this is really looking like it could be a very grim situation for that country, and if you thought things couldn’t get worse in Haiti, this would be how it can. Current model projections (which generally do a poor job handling specifics of tropical system precipitation totals) are dropping 8-10″ on southern Haiti. This is really a disheartening situation to watch, and hopefully precautions are already being taken to ensure the safety of residents and relief workers.
Elsewhere…
Still watching this storm for next week. In my forecasting for California next week, it was pretty obvious the differences in the main models (Euro and GFS). The GFS cuts down the western ridge and slides it to the Lee of the Rockies on Friday/Saturday, which has almost no support from any other model or its own ensemble members.
So what it’s doing is forcing everything in the east to develop further east, and therefore not as amplified. The Euro however last night took a deeper low out of the gulf and up the Appalachians into Western NY, wrapping the possibility of at least a few inches of snow on the backside for much of the mountains of Tennessee/North Carolina, up through West Virginia, eastern Ohio, western PA, Michigan, and western NY and Ontario, along with some lake effect or lake enhanced snow on the wrap around. The European has some support from the Canadian model (which is taking a 980 mb landbomb from the Carolinas northwest into OH/IN), which is also encouraging for confidence. This morning’s verison of the Euro was a little further east, and brought the chances for snow from the mountains of NC/TN up through WV’s mountains, and perhaps some in W PA and Eastern Ohio/Western NY, as well as Ontario and northern Michigan. It has to hit a fairly narrow window for snow, but if I had to place bets right now, I’d lean on Ontario/Michigan and not much more than that at the moment. Stay tuned.
Election Day Weather
With the big midterm elections coming up, there are all sorts of anecdotes about weather and people’s voting habits. Well, we’ll test the theory again this year, but primarily in the south. It looks like areas from Houston to New Orleans up through Mississippi and into Memphis and over to Little Rock will see the worst weather in the US on Election Day (as the late week storm begins to develop). Otherwise, other than a couple showers in the Northwest and parts of Minnesota it looks dry. So no excuses to stay home…go vote.
Cali Heat
I discussed how the European model keeps the western ridge in tact. Well that ridge is going to lead to searing autumn heat in California, with Santa Ana winds possibly leading to temperatures into the mid or upper 90s here in SoCal. It looks blazing hot Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday’s record high for Downtown LA is 99 degrees, and Wednesday’s is 95 degrees. Tuesday’s looks a lot safer than Wednesday’s at the moment. I suspect we could be talking record heat for a day or two in parts of SoCal. Been a year of some ridiculous temperature extremes out here.
We currently have two storms in the Atlantic, both of which are hurricanes. It’s October 30th…this is just slightly bizarre. According to Dr. Jeff Masters, this is the second latest point in the hurricane season we’ve ever had two hurricanes at once in the Atlantic (at least in the historical record). The latest was November 7-10, 1932.
Hurricane Shary
Shary is a weak category 1 storm (75 mph winds), and is currently beginning the transition to a non-tropical storm. Shary will continue to race toward Europe, likely bringing them a significant storm sometime this coming week. This will probably be the last we hear about Shary.
Hurricane Tomas
Radar Image From Meteo France of Hurricane Tomas near St. Vincent
Tomas is not quite as simple. We talked about the threat to the bigger islands later this coming week, but as you can see from the radar image from Meteo France to the left, Tomas is clearly bearing down on the smaller islands now. The current advisory as of 2 PM Atlantic Standard Time has Tomas as a 75 mph hurricane, near St. Vincent or about 25 miles south of St. Lucia. The pressure is still 992 mb, so we’re not looking at a very deep storm right now. This is just the humble beginnings.
Tomas will continue across the Caribbean, gradually building strength (the current NHC official forecast is for a 115 mph major hurricane by Tuesday night or Wednesday morning). And as you can see from the track forecast, it looks like the brakes get put on somewhere southeast of Jamaica and south of Haiti. As it either gets caught in a squeeze play..or the models are having issues resolving what’s next.
Morning Models Forecast Spaghetti Track of Hurricane Tomas from the South Florida Water Management District
Either way, this will likely be a prolific rain maker in some parts of the Caribbean and should it start to pull north late in the period, could be, again, a real serious blow to Haiti.
But another aspect that’s interesting regarding Tomas, is how it might interact with whatever system develops in the East next week. Just looking at new model data rolling in, the GFS is interesting, in that it it brings one storm up well into Northern New England on Thursday and Friday, with the potential for snow well north into Maine and Quebec, but the possibility of lake effect snow into New York and upslope snow in Vermont on the backside. It then takes a second storm out of the Gulf and up the East Coast, pretty far offshore and into Eastern New England, Maine, and the Canadian Maritimes. This storm would grab Tomas and inject it right into the system, so it would be very moist and potentially very strong (ironic as we’re celebrating the 19th anniversary of the “Perfect Storm” today).
The new European model coming in leaves Tomas behind in the Caribbean, but opens up a moisture plume all the way down there. So the storm deepens, but actually tracks up the Appalachians and west of Buffalo into Lake Huron. This would bring heavy snow potentially to parts of Michigan, and a heck of a lot of rain to parts of the East Coast and New England.
What does this mean? It means there is a LOT of uncertainty next week, and now that we know we have an organized tropical system possibly getting involved, well…that certainly makes the whole pattern more intriguing. It is interesting to note however that this European model solution has some similarities to the Canadian model we also look at. I’ll be watching this over the coming days.
Last item of note, a friend of mine at the NWS has helped put together what’s essentially a Bible of NWS lingo, products, items, places, services, as well as severe weather, safety, and much more. It’s a must bookmark and/or print for any meteorologist or serious weather enthusiast. Check it out here.
Just a quick late update here this evening. Hurricane hunters got into Tomas this evening and found 60 mph surface winds. That means this storm has strengthened quite a bit quicker than anticipated (frequently occurs in certain types of storms). Here’s a great blog entry from Dr. Jeff Masters, who’s actually embedded in the National Hurricane Center and describes what the forecasters there are going through at this moment. It provides some good insight into things there. We’ll just have to see how much further Tomas decides to intensify here early in the game.
Second, some really dramatic pictures from the Midwest storm in Minnesota. The one of the waves battering the lighthouse is truly awesome.
Lastly, more video emerging of the tornado from Rice, TX from last week. In this video (below), you can see the tornado actually taking out a freight train and watch as it crosses the highway. Some of the drivers in this video are incredibly lucky.
European Model Surface Plots (Left: Thursday morning, Right: Friday morning), From PSU E-Wall.
Not too much to add this afternoon on next week’s eastern system. There are still glaring differences between the models. The European model continues to go all bomb’s away off the East Coast. The GFS model continues to be flat..dumps some pretty chilly air in, but no storm. I continue to side with the Euro for the most part on this, with maybe not as much of an explosive system to develop later next week. Check this out. The European model (images above) takes the storm from about a 1008 mb weak low on the Carolina coast Thursday morning to a 972 mb beast in Central Maine on Friday morning. One key change with the European model today though is that it is not flinging quite as much moisture back into the cold air on the west side of the storm. This would spell less snow, except perhaps for the higher terrain of Northern New England (which would be hammered if the European model is correct).
So the take home message today is that, there’s still a chance for a pretty interesting storm. There’s a chance snow will be involved in some interior sections. There’s also a slight chance we could be dealing with another bomb cyclone, which could potentially cause significant weather impacts in parts of Northern New England and Quebec. So stay tuned…these sorts of battles aren’t uncommon between the two models. This will be a good test for the upcoming winter. Sometimes if a model shows a radical solution (like the Euro) and ends up correct, you can occasionally give that model some extra confidence through the winter season. In a tough situation, sometimes that can pay off huge if you’re a forecaster. So we will see.
In other news….
Model Spaghetti plot of tracks for Tropical Storm Shary, from South Florida Water Management District
The National Hurricane Center has started issuing advisories on two new tropical systems in the last 24 hours: Shary and Tomas. This brings the 2010 Atlantic Hurricane Season tally to: 19 named storms, 10 hurricanes, and 5 major hurricanes. Normal is 11/6/2 I believe. So we’re long gone in terms of normal.
So what about these two storms? Shary is more of a nuisance than anything. Expecting a mid-grade tropical storm (current winds 60 mph) that will bring gusty winds and locally heavy rain to Bermuda. Then it should scoot out to sea.
Tomas, on the other hand, has a potentially much more sinister future ahead. Tomas just formed, so its winds are only 40 mph, and it will scoot along in the Caribbean, likely not impacting anyone through the weekend (except perhaps some cruises or some outer rain bands/gusty winds on some of the islands). But Tomas is headed into an area of very favorable ocean and environmental conditions for development.
Model Spaghetti plot of tracks for Tropical Storm Tomas from South Florida Water Management District
The latest image from the LSU Earth Scan Lab shows a whole lotta red in the Caribbean. This spells development if the environmental conditions are right. And it appears they will be as we go into next week. The official track of Tomas from the NHC shows it becoming a major hurricane next week as it begins to turn north toward, sadly, Haiti. If there is one place in the Atlantic Basin that could really use a season without a direct impact from a storm, it’s Haiti. Still a long way to go, but this could very well shape up to be a devastating storm for someone. We’ll see.
Watching the Rutgers/Pitt game and trying to accomplish a bit before the Phillies tonight, so just some items of interest from the last couple days.
Tropics
The tropics are quite active globally as of late. Cyclone Giri absolutely unloaded yesterday on Burma (Myanmar) the same nation that was ravaged by Cyclone Nargis back in 2008. Giri is a bit of a scary situation as well, as it exploded right before landfall, which caught a lot of forecasters offguard, and it may have led to considerably less warning time for residents of that region. We’ll have to wait and see how bad the impacts of wind and rain are on that region.
Super Typhoon Megi, downgraded to a category one Typhoon Megi, hit China opposite of Taiwan today. So far it looks like its impacts on China will be minimal, but mudslides and the damage in the Philippines has taken close to 50 lives and caused substantial damage to parts of those countries.
NOAA satellite image of Tropical Storm Richard near the Honduras coast this afternoon
Lastly, and of more direct interest to people here, Tropical Storm Richard continues to churn in the Caribbean. Maximum sustained winds are at 65 mph now, and it’s likely, as Richard gradually eases away from the close pass to the coast, that it will become Hurricane Richard tonight or tomorrow. A tricky forecast, as the current movement (just north of west) and the proximity to the Central American coast means any little wobble or shift in direction will have a major impact on how strong Richard becomes and exactly where it will strike. The guarantee is that a lot of rain and strong winds will be impacting Honduras, Belize and the southern Yucatan over the next few days. Beyond that, it’s likely what is left of Richard will make it into the Gulf, but truthfully, the pattern when it gets there appears awfully hostile for any sort of development. So at this point, this is not a major concern to the US, but we’ll keep an eye on it in Mexico and Central America.
Stormy US
The pattern across the US is turning decidedly stormy, thanks in part to a raging jet stream crashing into the West Coast. Those are 150-175 kt winds slamming into Oregon. We’re seeing additional storminess in the Plains and the potential for some pretty decent severe weather provided by the departing system from earlier this week that hit California. This morning it’s the Dallas/Fort Worth area getting it worst (probably a good thing the Rangers/Yankees series didn’t go to game seven). Later today, areas further north should get it.
The storms in the Northwest and Northern California look extremely powerful, enhanced by tropical moisture that can be traced across the globe to where Typhoon Megi was! Here are some links to follow the powerful snow, wind, and rain that will impact some parts of the Northwest:
Discovery Online discusses whether or not tornadoes are increasing in the US. I did a similar analysis of hail reports in the Northeast US when I worked there, and I found that in the last 10-15 years there had been an explosion of hail being reported, whereas some of the reports from the Plains had actually begun to diminish or hold steady. But I really think this primarily has to do with the increasing connectivity of the world and the National Weather Service presence online that makes storm reporting easy for almost anyone. The NWS to their credit has also done a good job in fostering and improving their relationships in the communities they serve, which allows them to get reports a lot more easily. I imagine the tornado report increase is likely due to the fact that storm chasing has exploded in the last 10-15 years, and it’s now rare for any storm that produces a tornado in that part of the country to go unnoticed. I can’t really see much else being at work with this. Reports are easier to make and the NWS has become more proactive, and the combination has led to a much better net to capture reports.
Lots to hit on today. First and foremost, Tropical Storm Richard has formed today between Jamaica and Honduras, and it is storm number 17 of this 2010 hurricane season. Clearly hyperactive and clearly well forecasted from the start. Richard should gradually organize over the next day or two. It’s likely Richard will become a hurricane, and there’s also a decent chance it could become a major hurricane if the environment is right. Shear should be low over this in a couple days and the environment overall should be more favorable. A lot will be determined by how close to the Central American coast this storm gets. The closer, the better chance it does not intensify. The current model clustering suggests that the storm is headed for the southern Yucatan. However, there is a minority of models taking Richard toward the NE part of the Yucatan and then into the open Gulf of Mexico, which would imply less time over land. It’s a tough forecast right now, and I would lean closer to the track into the Yucatan north of the Belize border, likely as a strong, if not major hurricane. We’ll have to watch how close to land this gets early on. Beyond the Yucatan, it’s really up in the air as to where this thing goes…if it hooks toward Florida or moves into the open Gulf and hooks toward the Northeast Gulf Coast. Stay tuned. Track the latest official items on Richard here.
Winter
With winter rapidly approaching, an onslaught of forecasts is beginning to emerge. I’ve already seen multiple vendor forecasts at work, and today, the National Weather Service unveiled their own forecast for winter. The highlights?
– Warm. Overall the pattern of much above normal temperatures nationally from summer continues. The exceptions being the West Coast, Northwest (cool), and potentially the Northeast…where there are mixed signals.
– Dry in the South. From Florida over to Arizona and possibly SoCal…drier than normal. More on that shortly.
– Wet from the Tennessee Valley into the Great Lakes, which implies a storm track favorable for chaos in the East this winter. In other words: Higher risk of mixed precipitation and ice storms in much of the eastern Lakes, Appalachians and Mid Atlantic. Also wet in the Northwest, Northern Rockies and Northern California.
The forecast this winter, as expected, is dominated by La Nina, the periodic cooling of water in the Equatorial Pacific Ocean. And this year’s La Nina is raging at the moment, with no real signs of slowing. In my own opinion, their forecast is definitely acceptable. I’m finalizing my own ideas on winter, which I may present in some detail soon (I’ll at least present a summary…I may not post maps though for job reasons).
At least initially, I think the things that will be interesting will be: The development of a rather widespread, large drought (potentially…again, more on that in a moment), the potential for mixed/ice events from New York State into the Mid Atlantic, the potential for the Northwest to get slammed with heavy rain and heavy snow (with a lot of questions about temperatures possibly averaging above normal for a time), and New England…which could teeter on the edge of a blockbuster or lackluster winter. Again, I’ll discuss this more in the future.
Drought
This is beginning to get interesting. The US Drought Monitor report from this week shows some significant areas of drought from east Texas to Georgia. Abnormally dry to moderate drought conditions exist from Texas west to Arizona, which has been in a relatively long term drought. Referencing the NOAA forecast above, if you assume the southern tier gets abnormally dry conditions all winter, you can see where this is heading. Now, it’s not a slam dunk that this winter is going to be bone dry…nothing ever is, but past history suggests that this could be a pretty dry winter for a number of reasons (if you’re curious for a decent breakdown of these reasons, check out this blog posting from the Houston Chronicle).
The Baja Peninsula has been quite seismically active since I moved out here in 2009. It’s been interesting to watch. They’ve had several 3-5.0 quakes in south-central Baja the last few days. Today those erupted into a 6.7 magnitude quake, the same day, ironically, as the Great California Shakeout earthquake drill. If anything, this just serves as a reminder that we’re not immune from quakes and potentially large ones at that in this part of the world. Hopefully today’s 6.7 marks the end of the big shakers there for a bit.
This time of year can be one of more intriguing times of year from a weather standpoint. The tropics are winding down, but can still produce some fun. Cold air is gradually building and occasionally flexing here in the US, so you can get some fascinating storms. We’re starting to see the pattern build a bit, especially starting over this coming weekend in the Northwest, where it looks like a series of systems promise to start building snowpack and bringing some widespread wind and rain to Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia. The graphic shows this morning’s run of the GFS and the total amount of precipitation forecasted through day ten. Notice about 4-6″ showing up in the Pacific Northwest. Not a bad haul.
Outside of that, there’s not much exciting going on weatherwise this week here in the US. Keep an eye on Arizona and the Southwest again Tuesday-Thursday, as another one of these pesky cutoff lows (haven’t seen sun here in SoCal since last Wednesday or Thursday) gradually comes onshore and works inland. This one isn’t as strong as the one we had earlier this month that caused the tornado outbreak in AZ, but still could be enough to pop some decent storms there.
Super Typhoon Megi Satellite Loop Also, if you like satellite imagery and blogs, this one is one to bookmark, as they often produce some beautiful loops such as this. Megi made landfall in the Philippines and sounds as though it did a fair amount of damage and disruption. We’ll see. Here’s the latest on Megi, which may actually be headed for just south of Hong Kong now, a couple hundred miles further north than the thinking yesterday. Here’s a blog entry from Dr. Jeff Masters at Weather Underground with a link to a beautiful satellite image of Megi. Additional satellite imagery here.
Interesting story in the LA Times today about how a water fight is underway about redirecting Colorado River water from the LA area to the Salton Sea southeast of Palm Springs to help desalinate it and sustain it. I suspect stories like this will become more frequent in coming years as the strain on the water supply out here continues to increase. Along those same lines… Lake Mead records its lowest level…ever.
Zoo With Roy is probably my favorite Phillies blog, and put together this awesomeness depicting Roy Oswalt blowing through the stop sign last night. As an aside, what a great game by the Phillies last night. Hopefully it puts the fan base at ease. I said Phils in six, assuming we beat Lincecum and lost to Sanchez at home. We did the opposite, but the same end result I expected I guess. Should be an interesting game in San Francisco tomorrow. Weather looks fantastic, with mid to upper 60s and a good deal of sunshine. Perfect fall weather by the Bay.
And lastly, I have to share this link to send a get well message to Rutgers defensive tackle Eric LeGrand who was involved in horrific tackle in the game vs. Army over the weekend that has sadly left him paralyzed below his neck. Keep him and his family in your thoughts and prayers.
At the left is a satellite image from NOAA depicting the massive nor’easter hitting New England yesterday. This was a very impressive storm, and it continues to impact with strong winds (as evidenced by watching the Rutgers/Army game at the Meadowlands Stadium). Gusts have generally been in the 35-55 mph range. Though I did see a 69 mph gust in Bennington County, VT (Woodford), that I assume was at a high elevation. Mount Washington in New Hampshire looks to have done just over 72 mph in the last 24 hours.
In terms of snowfall, it appears that an average of 6-12″ fell at some of the higher peaks of the Adirondacks and Green Mountains. I’ve seen 8″ reported at Little Whiteface Mountain, 7″ as of yesterday at Mt. Mansfield, VT, and 14″ at Killington. All in all a fairly impressive event!
Typhoon Megi
As the tropics in the Atlantic slowly wind down, the incredibly quiet Western Pacific is finally seeing some interesting activity. Typhoon Megi is a 120 mph storm, which will likely become a supertyphoon and appears headed for the northern part of Luzon (main island of the Philippines). The current forecast has it making landfall early morning (US Time) on Monday
. You can track Megi here. Also, Crownweather.com has a nice website with images and information on Megi. After the Philippines, it looks to head toward Hainan Island in southern China.
Arizona Tornado Outbreak
The National Weather Service in Flagstaff has put up a tremendous website with lots of images, graphics, pictures, and information on the tornado outbreak that struck parts of Arizona earlier this month. This event will go down as the largest single day tornado outbreak in Arizona history. Of course, we can assume that, but Arizona has become more densely populated in recent years, so there are probably a number of weather events that have gone unnoticed in that state in years past. That said, this was an incredible outbreak for anywhere west of the Continental Divide. I happened to be at work that morning monitoring some rain here in SoCal, but fixed on the radar in Central and Northern Arizona. Some of those radar signatures were as good as you’d see anywhere in the country. Some good stuff on that website from above.
Scientists and Programming
An interesting final topic for today. I found a link to an article from the Journal Nature’s website. The article discusses how in the wake of Climategate, there was a somewhat undiscussed issue that involved scientists and their ability to write code. One of the emails had a comment from a CRU scientists claiming his programming skills were “awful.” This is somewhat disturbing in the sense that a lot of what is being done in the climate arena (and other areas too) is being programmed and written now by scientists. The bottom line is that the skills of a lot of people has not caught up to the pace of technological development. It’s a good read, and it brings up some interesting points that you wouldn’t normally think about that I think illustrates a larger problem in our field, as well as other science fields. But I think with the discussion and the realization that what some of these scientist programmers do is so important to the field and research, this should help bring some additional awareness to the topic at hand. Hopefully at least in our field of meteorology, some of the graduate programs that exist more rigorously emphasize programming in their curriculum going forward.
State of Occlusion 
