Christmas Storm of 1994

[Hyperstorm]

This is the only satellite photo I could find, but I hope that it works. Sorry, it is so small. At least, you can have an idea of what was there at the time. You can definitely see a smaller circular storm with convection, within the broader scale extratropical storm, suggesting some subtropical characteristics.

[weatherluvr]

Thanks everybody for your help and info. Based on what I've seen there could definitely be a case for this to be classified as subtropical. Guess we'll have to wait and see.

[Dave C]

I,m into historical winter storms in New England and there have been many hybrid types in the last 200 years. The most famous was in Jan 1857 which had an eye feature as it tracked across SE New England. Places like Worcester Boston etc. had sunny skies, although the wind didn't let up, for 2-3 hrs as it tracked SW to NE across the area. 20+" fell across most of southern New Engand with mountanous drifts. It also included extreme cold during the storm with temps below 0 in many areas as the first flakes fell, rising no higher than 10-20 deg. during the height of the storm even in coastal communities. David Ludlum wrote 2 books on these incredible storms in New Englands history and they provide very interesting reading!!!

[Stormsfury]

Just received this today from Jack Beven ... very interesting read ... and mucho thanks for taking the time to respond.

Glenn, Mike, and all,

I'm the forecaster at NHC who did an extensive study of this storm. My post-analysis
indicated that the maximum sustained winds were around 70 kt and the minimum
central pressure around 968 mb. What's still somewhat in doubt even now is how frontal
the storm actually was at higher latitudes.

This storm formed over the Gulf of Mexico along a frontal boundary. Indeed,
the day it crossed south Florida, I flew through the frontal boundary in a commuter
plane on final approach to Miami International Airport (not fun!). However, once
it got into the Atlantic, it started producing organized convection, eventually ending
up in at least partial eyewall. Even at that time, though, it still had long frontal-like
cloud bands. That, combined with the origin and the time of year, cast some doubt
as to the exact nature of the beast.

There's little doubt in my mind that the system had a warm core. This was
seen in aircraft data from a winter storm reconnaissance mission and implied
by data from the Taunton WSR-88D. There's also little doubt in my mind that
convective process played a significant role in the development - especially
after the low-level cold air supply for the original frontal boundary was diverted
into a second low along the southeast coast of the United States. Whether
that's enough to justify calling this a subtropical or even tropical cyclone is
still debatable.

As Chris said, we'll be taking a look at this storm as part of the re-ananlysis
project. It may be that some of the techniques that have been developed for
analyzing such cyclones since that time will shed some new light on the data.

I presented a talk on this and two other interesting systems at the
22nd AMS Conference on Tropical Storms and Hurricanes in 1997.
Re-prints are available if anyone is interested.

Jack Beven
Tropical Prediction Center

[weatherluvr]

Thanks for the info Mike. What I find really interesting is that the ULL that created the Fujiwhara effect also may have had a hand in transforming the system by evacuating the cold air behind it. I'm really anxious to see what their analysis turns up.

[HalloweenGale]

Dude, I flew through that storm! I own a restored C 130 (I used to be a hurricane hunter.) I took off from ACK (Nantucket airport), and headed southwest. I entered the storm about 250 miles later, that storm was pretty darn rough. The Eye was clouded over, and had the moon with a halo around it. I stayed with the storm until it hit Nantucket, and Lets say the landing was bumpy... very bumpy

[HalloweenGale]

Hey all you storm2kers out there, i am writing a book that will be named Hurricanes and their kin it will cover the EPAC,NATL,WPAC,CPAC,BOB,AS,GREAT LAKES, AND THE GULF OF MAINE. it will detail every storm from 1954 to the present and yes Hurricane SANTA will be chronicled.