OT: Question for the weather gurus on here
- Thread starter Damn-Dog
- Start date
Not necessarily. There was plenty of cold air this winter. It just all went into Europe instead of here. They had one of their worst winters ever. What it may do, though, is cause an increase in number and severity of hurricanes. Water temps in the Gulf are already in the mid-70's. 80 degrees is the temp threshhold for hurricanes. We will probably hit that sooner than normal this year and the Gulf may warm more than normal. As for our regular summer temps...history has shown no coorelation between a mild winter and a hot summer.
Gulf temps are running a few degrees warmer than average. Now last year we said the same thing and didn't get hit in the Gulf, but we got pretty lucky. Last year had the potential to be really bad and the Gulf states missed out, especially with Irene. For a while Irene was looking like a Gulf storm and it ended up East Coast.
Without getting too technical, we will have to watch some of the El Nino/La Nina stuff, as well as a few other things to see how the pattern progresses once we get into hurricane season. But the Gulf waters really didn't see much cold weather this year, so they will be warm.That will be the main thing I watch out for going into summer, especially how the El Nino/La Nina progression goes, and well as another more well known oscillation called the Madden-Julian.
Without getting too technical, we will have to watch some of the El Nino/La Nina stuff, as well as a few other things to see how the pattern progresses once we get into hurricane season. But the Gulf waters really didn't see much cold weather this year, so they will be warm.That will be the main thing I watch out for going into summer, especially how the El Nino/La Nina progression goes, and well as another more well known oscillation called the Madden-Julian.
Also have to watch the transition from La Nina to El Nino. La Nina years you can see lots of hurricanes (past two years) but due to amplified trough/ridge pattern and therefore, more cold fronts, you see most of them turn out to sea. El Nino years you see a strengthened subtropical jet which flows over Mexico into the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea and somewhat into the southwest Atlantic. This subtropical jet can shear or tear storms apart. The problem is it first depends on how quickly we transition into El Nino or how strong it will be. If its not strong or near neutral (aka 2005 and Hurricane Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma) we could be in for some trouble this year. Because if we get near a neutral or weak El Nino pattern, you don't see as many cold fronts to turn them out to sea and then they come our way..Then you get weak shearing winds and thus they begin to track toward the United States and possibly Gulf
and are not weakened or impeded on developing or strengthening. Plus, the Gulf temps were not tapped into last summer's hurricane season and even the winter hasn't really cooled it off and thus lots of warm waters for fueling rapid strengthening/hurricane development..Some areas in the central Gulf in the Loop Current (area of the deepest warmest waters of the Gulf that strengthened Hurricane Katrina into a Cat 5) are near or over 80 degrees. There is going to be a lot of energy available for this hurricane season. The only kink in this season is that the drought over Texas has caused dry air that caused that one that hit TX to dissipate upon arrival last year so we will see how that affects Gulf hurricanes this year (if they happen to get into the Gulf and usually dry air can get into the center of circulation and kill/weaken a storm). Agreed w/ mstatefan88 that we would need to watch the MJO pulse also as that has a high correlation to more hurricane activity. Another thing to watch is will there be lots of upper level lows like previous years that killed lots of storms as they sheared them apart. The last thing to watch is these warm temperatures could impact a possibly busy severe weather season in April as warmer Gulf temps means more intense warm air advection and thus higher dewpoints and more instability and lower cloud bases for a higher tornado likelihood..A warmer gulf just spells trouble if the patterns for severe wx/ hurricanes pan out..
and are not weakened or impeded on developing or strengthening. Plus, the Gulf temps were not tapped into last summer's hurricane season and even the winter hasn't really cooled it off and thus lots of warm waters for fueling rapid strengthening/hurricane development..Some areas in the central Gulf in the Loop Current (area of the deepest warmest waters of the Gulf that strengthened Hurricane Katrina into a Cat 5) are near or over 80 degrees. There is going to be a lot of energy available for this hurricane season. The only kink in this season is that the drought over Texas has caused dry air that caused that one that hit TX to dissipate upon arrival last year so we will see how that affects Gulf hurricanes this year (if they happen to get into the Gulf and usually dry air can get into the center of circulation and kill/weaken a storm). Agreed w/ mstatefan88 that we would need to watch the MJO pulse also as that has a high correlation to more hurricane activity. Another thing to watch is will there be lots of upper level lows like previous years that killed lots of storms as they sheared them apart. The last thing to watch is these warm temperatures could impact a possibly busy severe weather season in April as warmer Gulf temps means more intense warm air advection and thus higher dewpoints and more instability and lower cloud bases for a higher tornado likelihood..A warmer gulf just spells trouble if the patterns for severe wx/ hurricanes pan out..
2010 was supposedly going to be the WORST recorded hurricane season of all. I'm not even sure if >5 hurricanes hit the gulf, much less formed at all.
There were 19 named storms. Just because a hurricane doesn't hit somewhere near you or in the U.S. doesn't mean the season wasn't active.
To get on my soapbox for a minute, it's comments like that that help me realize why people act stupidly with regards to weather. They are just plain uninformed. People say "oh, there were no landfalling U.S.hurricanes that year, so the meteorologists must be idiots and don't know what they are talking about when they said it would be active." Instead, there were 19 named storms and tons of damage in many countries that year, it just so happened we didn't have much damage.
It goes the same for the people that might have been 300 miles away from a landfalling category3hurricane, then a few years later they are directly in the path of one but decide not to evacuate because they got through it last time. Just makes no sense to me.
It amazes me how uninformed people are about weather. I'm now off my soapbox.
To get on my soapbox for a minute, it's comments like that that help me realize why people act stupidly with regards to weather. They are just plain uninformed. People say "oh, there were no landfalling U.S.hurricanes that year, so the meteorologists must be idiots and don't know what they are talking about when they said it would be active." Instead, there were 19 named storms and tons of damage in many countries that year, it just so happened we didn't have much damage.
It goes the same for the people that might have been 300 miles away from a landfalling category3hurricane, then a few years later they are directly in the path of one but decide not to evacuate because they got through it last time. Just makes no sense to me.
It amazes me how uninformed people are about weather. I'm now off my soapbox.
Just because we had a mild winter doesn't mean that the summer is going to be hot. From models I have looked at and reading several different blogs there is a pretty good case for a normal or even "cool" summer. Things change season to season and there are pattern changes.
