An above-average number of tropical storms and hurricanes is more likely if temperatures in the main development region (MDR) between Africa and the Caribbean Sea are warmer than average. Conversely, below-average ocean temperatures can lead to fewer tropical systems than if waters were warmer.
Assuming atmospheric factors are favorable, warmer waters in the MDR allow tropical waves – the formative engines that can eventually become tropical storms – to get closer to the Caribbean and the U.S.
The prevalence of wind shear and dry air across the Atlantic will also need to be watched over the next six to eight months.
If La Niña does kick in, as many forecasters expect, and the atmosphere responds to it, there could be less wind shear and more favorable conditions for hurricane growth toward the end of the season.
How much dry air rolls off the coast of Africa will also need to be monitored. Even if water temperatures are very warm and there is little wind shear, dry air can still disrupt developing tropical cyclones and even prohibit their birth.
Hurricanes need a precise set of ingredients to come together in order for them to fester, and those ingredients will need to be monitored this year.
Crawford also noted that computer model forecasts for tropical forcing during the heart of the hurricane season are "strongly suggestive of an active season," and his forecast is similar to the model consensus.
The JTWC has this storm peaking at 125 kt sustained winds in 24 hours. My experience is that agency predictions like these have been very conservative. I won't be shocked if it approaches 150 kts.
https://www.metoc.navy.mil/jtwc/jtwc.html
Note, the deadliest cyclone in human history was Bhola in this region in 1970. Estimated 300k-500k lost.
Edit: imagine the stress on authorities tasked with trying to strike the right balance between both limiting covid spread and storm related suffering. This storm is looking very ominous.
More than 1 million people at the India-Bangladesh border are preparing to evacuate before Super Cyclone Amphan, which is predicted to make landfall Wednesday evening.
The Indian Meteorological Department said Amphan, which developed in the Bay of Bengal, will reach wind speeds Monday of 167 miles per hour, and will arrive in the northeastern Indian states of Odisha and West Bengal and on the coast of Bangladesh, near the Ganges River Delta.
Meteorologists predicted Monday that the storm will lose some intensity as it hits land, but could cause storm surges as high as 30 feet.
SN Pradhan, director general of the Indian National Disaster Response Force, said that on top of the coronavirus epidemic, the cyclone presented a "dual challenge" to safely house evacuees while taking steps to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
Many migrant workers returning to Odisha and West Bengal for the national pandemic lockdown have been housed in temporary quarantine centers which are now in the path of the cyclone.
In Bangladesh, surges of high winds, rain and flooding from the cyclone are expected to strike the Cox's Bazar refugee settlement, where more than 1 million Rohingya refugees have gathered in primitive conditions after fleeing persecution in Myanmar.
Amphan is the first super cyclone in the Bay of Bengal since 1999, when a super storm hit the Orissa coast, killing more than 9,000 people.
In almost every region of the world where hurricanes form, their maximum sustained winds are getting stronger. That is according to a new study by scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration National Center for Environmental Information and University of Wisconsin-Madison Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies, who analyzed nearly 40 years of hurricane satellite imagery.
"Through modeling and our understanding of atmospheric physics, the study agrees with what we would expect to see in a warming climate like ours," says James Kossin, a NOAA scientist based at UW-Madison and lead author of the paper, which is published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The research builds on Kossin's previous work, published in 2013, which identified trends in hurricane intensification across a 28-year data set. However, says Kossin, that timespan was less conclusive and required more hurricane case studies to demonstrate statistically significant results.
Kossin's previous research has shown other changes in hurricane behavior over the decades, such as where they travel and how fast they move. In 2014, he identified poleward migrations of hurricanes, where tropical cyclones are travelling farther north and south, exposing previously less-affected coastal populations to greater risk.
In 2018, he demonstrated that hurricanes are moving more slowly across land due to changes in Earth's climate. This has resulted in greater flood risks as storms hover over cities and other areas, often for extended periods of time.
dohboi wrote:Evacuating a million plus people during a pandemic is going to be...interesting
dohboi wrote:Thanks for that info, Newf. So a third of waves will be over 52 feet!
Is that just going to be out at sea, or are they going to get anything like that height hitting the very flat and very densely populated areas it is forecast to hit?
dohboi wrote:As Reagan might say, 'There you go again, Newf, being cavalier about the sickness and deaths of brown people"![]()
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In certain circumstances--people in close quarters for a prolonged period of time, such as would likely happen during an evacuation-- the death rate can be more like over 30,000 per million:
https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/st ... r-outbreak
...storm surge could rise to around five metres in the Sundarbans delta, home to around four million people.
"Our estimate is that some areas 10-15 kilometres from the coast could be inundated"...
...A lot of houses have been washed away...
dohboi wrote:...storm surge could rise to around five metres in the Sundarbans delta, home to around four million people.
"Our estimate is that some areas 10-15 kilometres from the coast could be inundated"...
...A lot of houses have been washed away...
Something like four million evacuees.
Amazingly, only 14 reported dead so far.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/ ... 55647.html
dirtyharry wrote:dohboi wrote:...storm surge could rise to around five metres in the Sundarbans delta, home to around four million people.
"Our estimate is that some areas 10-15 kilometres from the coast could be inundated"...
...A lot of houses have been washed away...
Something like four million evacuees.
Amazingly, only 14 reported dead so far.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/ ... 55647.html
In the meanwhile temperatures in New Delhi touch 44.1 degree celsuis and are expected to remain so for the next 5 days . Crazy .
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