California hurricane (hypothetically speaking)

[HurricaneBill]

I'm wondering if sooner or later, a hurricane will make its way to California. I'm curious as to how it would happen.

My scenario would be this:

It is a year with a strong El Nino.

A tropical storm forms off the SW coast of Mexico. We'll say its name is "Annette". (Just an example name)

Annette would move NW and begin to intensify and become upgraded to a hurricane.

Annette would have to turn NNW and enter the Gulf of California. Typically, this area is warmer than the water off the western coast of Baja California.

At this point, Annette would have to be at least a Category 3 with sustained winds of maybe around 125 mph.

Annette would have to maneuver through the Gulf of California and conditions would have to be right for her to weaken as slowly as possible. Her speed would need to increase.

Annette would basically have to follow a track similar to Hurricane Marty in 2003.

Annette could probably make landfall on that strip of land connecting Mexico and Baja California as a Category 1 hurricane at most with winds of 90-95 mph.

Annette would then move into southern California. If Annette survives as a hurricane, sustained winds would probably be no higher than 80 mph tops.


Remember, this is just a scenario I came up with. I am no weather expert. This is pretty much a guess as to how a hurricane would make it to California.

[Hurricanehink]

Hmm.... that's possible, but it may have to be stronger. Those mountains are very high, and it may rip apart a storm, not to mention cool temperatures to the west. A tropical storm could hit that way fairly easily with that scenario, but who knows, maybe someday it could happen to a hurricane.

Ooh, what if it was subtropical, like Storm 12 of 1975.

That formed at 31º north, almost the same latitude as California. What if it formed further eastward, and went east instead of west? I know it seems unheard of, but you never know with the tropics these days. BTW, does anyone have the 1920s tropical storm that actually hit California?

[weatherluvr]

There's two possible ways for a hurricane to affect California. One would be the "up-the-chute" method you described, like Juliette in 2001. However, the high mountains on both sides of the Gulf of California would significantly weaken any system moving up this way.

The most likely scenario would be a storm staying just west of Baja California, turning NE at around San Diego. This is what happened in 1939 with the "El Cordonazo" storm that made landfall as a 50 mph TS.

Conditions would have to be exactly right for a hurricane to hit Southern California. It almost came together in 1997 with Linda. For a couple of days it appeared at least possible Linda might hit California as a minimal hurricane, but it turned away. Here's a good article on Linda.

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wlinda.htm

Storms that have affected California:

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/whhcalif.htm

[Aslkahuna]

has seen up the chute storms that have come in as Tropical Storms and which have brought hurricane force wind gusts. However, our biggest TS here in Sierra Vista (Lester in 1992) actually came at us across lower Baja
but was accelerating so retained structure further inland. The 24/0600Z August 1992 position for Lester which has it just northwest of us is good but final track intensity on the storm is low as our mesonet recorded winds of nearly 50mph in a 15 minute average which translates to one minute averages of 50-60 mph with gusts of 70-80mph.

Steve

[HurricaneBill]

I wonder if Arizona is more likely to get hit by a hurricane than California?

[AussieMark]

Arizona may be more of a change than California. Storms that strike Baja California their remnants may drift north into that portion of the US.

[weatherluvr]

There was one up-the-chute storm that made to the SW US... Katrina in 1967...

[Stephanie]

Wasn't there a hurricane/tropical storm in the Pacific last year that brought benenficial rains along the border of Mexico after it came onshore?

[Hurricanehink]

Wasn't there a hurricane/tropical storm in the Pacific last year that brought benenficial rains along the border of Mexico after it came onshore?

Both Marty and Ignacio brought benificial rain to the Southwest U.S. They needed it too.