Hurricane in Kansas?

It's been some time since I made a tropical report. That is because nothing much has been happening. There is some formulation going on off the Florida and Georgia coasts. This has just recently been named Invest 93L. So what is Invest 93L going to do?

GFS - splits in half like the Wonder Twins when they activate, with one half going up the Atlantic seaboard and the other barreling into New Orleans.
GFDL - not much of anything. But then when it gets in the Gulf, it blows up into a Category 1 hurricane and hits New Orleans. Just what they need. Then it goes up into the Midwest, still maintaining tropical storm strength, right into Kansas and Missouri.
NOGAPS - Has been hurricane-conservative all season long. This one makes a tropical storm in the Gulf and takes it to the oil producing regions of Texas, south of Houston.
UKMET - Into New Orleans as a Class 4 storm or Category 1 hurricane.
HWRF - A small X in the corner.
CMC - into northwestern Florida as a tropical storm.

Now you see what I mean by a hurricane in Kansas. That's a bit overblown. The model still shows it as a tropical storm in Kansas. The main hazard I think is to New Orleans, where three of the models are sending this storm to. Remember that the Gulf waters are warm at this time of the year. Any little two-bit storm that gets into the Gulf now could blow up suddenly into a Category 5 hurricane. Look at Humberto. It had an extra few hundred miles of water to go through than they figured, and that was almost enough to make it into a Category 2 hurricane.

Now for the Sea Ice report. I got a reply to an email I sent to Jeff Masters. He says the ice has reached a minimum and will now start to expand. This is what I would think. But in the past week it has actually been shrinking. There is a lot of warm (if you call 40 F warm) water in the Arctic ocean, and that could inhibit the ice from forming as fast. So when will it start to expand? In October, we should see snow expand all over the place in Canada and Siberia. At around this time, the ice sheet should start advancing in a noticeable way. But when in October will this be?

Marine Summer Solstice

It has arrived. 2007 September 10 is the Marine Summer Solstice, the date when the warmth in the oceans and other bodies of waters reaches its peak. After today, temperature should decline in the oceans as we begin heading for 2008 March 10, the Marine Winter Solstice.

So how is the Marine Summer Solstice marked? First of all, it is the time when Arctic sea ice is at a minimum. From this time on, we can expect ice in the north to increase. The Weather Solstice already has occurred (July 26 or thereabouts) and so there has been cooling on the continents, and already snow is falling in eastern Russia and the Canadian high arctic islands. So what happened to the ice on September 11? It shrunk! That's right, it melted substantially and now nearly half of the Arctic Ocean is free of ice. This has to have an effect on the coming winter. One would think the winter should be abnormally warm, especially in eastern Russia and western Alaska. Further, with more moisture in the air, one would think that these areas would have more snow than usual, and it seems that this snow is already starting. The worst effect of this warmth is if it starts the Greenland ice sheet to melting. But that area is near the part of the Arctic Ocean that has not melted.

September 10 is also the peak of the hurricane season. So far we have had a season midway between the two previous seasons. There have been two Category 5 hurricanes, Dean and Felix. I followed Dean for about 3 weeks, from when it started as a storm in central Africa. We just had a squibbler of a storm (Gabrielle) hit the Outer Banks. So what's coming up next?

NOAA is tracking Invest 91L, a new one, in the Atlantic. This may become a tropical storm soon. Some models develop it into a Category 3 hurricane, but GFS so far has it dissipating before it gets close to land. The GFS runs keep showing over and over again, about two weeks from now, around 2007 September 26, a storm originating in the Caribbean, crossing the Yucatan strait into the Gulf of Mexico, and hitting the US coast. Earlier runs had it hitting New Orleans, but more recent runs show it flirting with Florida. So the season is not over yet.

So that's the Marine Summer Solstice. The next major point is September 23, the midpoint of Solar Autumn, when the nights start getting longer than the days.

Invest 99L

Felix has crashed into Nicaragua and Honduras - the first time that two Category 5 storms have struck land as Category 5 storms in the same season. It is traveling well to the south, and will probably dissipate in the high mountains of Central America after dumping 20-30 inches of rain in those areas.

I had also been following a disturbance in Africa that GFS says will launch from Africa and cross the Atlantic. But there is another upstart now. A bunch of clouds formed off the South Carolina coast. They have moved away from shore and show up as a cloud mass well out to sea in satellite photographs. The cloud mass looks like the hairdo of a Weather Channel broadcaster who was giving a report on the storm on or about 2007 September 4 1315 EDT.

The weather models predict the storm will head back to the US, as a tropical storm or hurricane. Some storms have done this. Tropical Storm Dean 1983 went out into the Atlantic, then turned around and headed towards Washington, DC. Hurricane Betsy (1965) went out into the Atlantic, started to approach the Carolinas, then did a loopdy loop and hit southern Florida and then New Orleans. Hurricane Ophelia in 2005 wandered about like a drunk on the ocean off the northern Florida coast, then staggered up the southeastern coast, grazing the Outer Banks.

Here is what the models say about Invest 99L:

GFS: the latest model run shows it going out to sea, and then splitting, with one half headed back to the Virginia coast, then turning around and heading towards New England
NOGAPS: Turns around and heads towards Florida, skirting by the northern Florida coast and striking the Carolinas.
HWRF: Hits New England after skirting Outer Banks
CMC: Hits Outer Banks then Central Virginia

One model (I can't find it now) has it turning around to Florida, crossing it near Daytona Beach, then going into the Gulf of Mexico and hitting the Mississippi area, and shortly after that, what's left of Felix then hits the same area.

This one is all over the place. Further, the official weather forecast for Richmond makes absolutely no mention of it: "Partly cloudy, high in upper 80s". One local TV met ignores 99L completely, and the other two mention it, saying we have to watch it, and making some allowance for it by calling for rain late this weekend. Jeff Masters lists several of the models and says where they take the storm.

Oh, yes. The storm from Africa. As of 18Z, it seems to be less of a threat. The last three runs of GFS show it going out to sea long before it reaches the states. The run before that one does have it heading to the Carolinas, but now Invest 99L has taken all the attention. That's the storm to watch. It may turn into a storm, perhaps a hurricane, this weekend, and some models show it going to Florida or to New York or New England. Keep tuned.

And don't forget Henriette. It made landfall today also, at Cabo San Lucas, as a minimal hurricane. It is the first time ever that two hurricane landfalls have been observed in the same day. Henriette will come up Mexico and then Arizona and New Mexico, where it will pour huge amounts of rain on unaccustomed deserts. Then it may go to the east and affect east coast weather, and maybe even influence the motion of Gabrielle and Humberto, as I imagine these two storms I discuss today are going to be called.

Felix Explodes But Two Others Are Threatening

Felix is really something. It exploded. The only thing like it that I have seen is Hurricane Wilma in 2005. Yesterday it was just a measly little old 50 or so mph tropical storm. All of a sudden today it is Category 5! Its winds, already 165 mph, could go faster. Could it reach Category 6? This is my own category that I define as a tropical system with top winds of 180-225 mph. To date I have never seen or heard of a Category 6 storm, but there could be a first. Its biggest threats are to the same ones who had to put up with Dean, namely the Yucatan, Belize, mainland Mexico and perhaps Texas.

There are, however, two other storms that are of more importance to people in the US. There is a storm hanging off the coast of South Carolina. This reminds me of Gaston in 2004. The Canadian model shows it going out to sea, becoming a major hurricane, then turning back to the northwest, nicking Virginia and North Carolina, then smashing into the New York City area a little east of Manhattan. The GFS shows it meandering around and weak. Hope this doesn't turn into another Gaston.

The other one reminds me a lot of Dean. It is a storm in western Africa. For some time I have been following this storm. It gets off the coast, develops into a hurricane, and goes westward in the Atlantic. It strikes various positions on the East Coast. It has this GFS number, dating from the beginning of September:

47696897

It looks like an Atlantic storm, but it could go out to sea. Further, there is a train of other storms following this one. It probably will be named Gabrielle, that is, unless the storm off the South Carolina develops first, in which case this Africa storm will be Humberto. The latest run has it going to New York City, and some other runs have shown this. If it hits the Big Apple, the result could be an economic setback. How will the stock market operate if much of its stuff got sent out to sea in a storm surge?

Seems like the middle to late part of the month will be really active. And oh, yes, the Arctic ice is still melting, with the Marine Summer Solstice only a few days away (September 10).