ATL: HARVEY - Post-Tropical - Discussion

[Langinbang187]

I'm thankful that Harvey never made it sub 920 and 160mph winds like I thought it would, the EWRC prevented it... but at the same time it was intensifying at landfall which can oftentimes be worse than a slightly stronger hurricane that has peaked or is weakening too. I wouldn't be surprised if this had some 140mph sustained winds in the NE eyewall as it made landfall, this was probably one of the best IR/visible hurricanes I've seen in the Atlantic with the perfect, large eye and symmetrical CDO. Prayers and thoughts to all who are affected by Harvey...

I don't think he ever had a realistic/great shot at 160 MPH winds. If anything the EWRC came at the perfect time to allow him to reach max intensity. The fact that the EWRC came so early, and was completed so quickly allowed Harvey to intensify all the way up until landfall.

[Kingarabian]

Harvey had skeptics the whole time as he steadily climbed the ladder. I recall the "ragged" adjective being used 24 hours ago simply because the IR cloud tops warmed due to the sun. This storm steadily intensified (with some spurts tossed in) for 48 hours. it was remarkable persistent, relentless development. I am a believer in visible sat pics during the day and central pressure readings 24 hours a day (smoothed out) when trying to gauge development.

Harvey never had a cloud top warming issue, it had structure issues due to modest shear that was evident when you looked at IR or visible imagery 24 hours ago. Microwave also kept showing an eyewall that kept opening and closing meaning that there was something disrupting the system. That being said, maybe if it weren't for the shear Harvey would've been a Cat.5 hurricane.

[GeneratorPower]

People are not taking real news seriously, in part, because so much of the modern news media is overhyped. Matthew last year also made a lot of Florida people skeptical.

[sponger]

Hope we get some good news out of Port Aransas but it does not look good.

[txwatcher91]

I'm thankful that Harvey never made it sub 920 and 160mph winds like I thought it would, the EWRC prevented it... but at the same time it was intensifying at landfall which can oftentimes be worse than a slightly stronger hurricane that has peaked or is weakening too. I wouldn't be surprised if this had some 140mph sustained winds in the NE eyewall as it made landfall, this was probably one of the best IR/visible hurricanes I've seen in the Atlantic with the perfect, large eye and symmetrical CDO. Prayers and thoughts to all who are affected by Harvey...

I don't think he ever had a realistic/great shot at 160 MPH winds. If anything the EWRC came at the perfect time to allow him to reach max intensity. The fact that the EWRC came so early, and was completed so quickly allowed Harvey to intensify all the way up until landfall.

Had the EWRC not happened this would have been testing a cat 5 but peaked before landfall and would have been starting one as it came ashore. Instead it started one early which had it strengthening as it was moving inland. Another 6-12 hours and it would have been close to a cat 5, the structure was incredible and it appears the pressure bottomed out 935-938 range.

[sbcc]

A once-in-a-lifetime video still (I think, but I don't know which video it was taken from yet) was captured from the eye last night: Stadium effect from the ground, lightning in the eyewall, and an eye clear enough to see the stars.

Something about it seems fake or at least composited to me. Perhaps that the stars and the lightning are equally well exposed. I would expect the clouds to be overexposed if the stars are well exposed. This is me speaking as an astrophysics grad student...stars are many orders of magnitude fainter than a nearby lightning flash. Perhaps it is a composite photo.

It isn't a composite as another poster showed. It's lucky timing. I think the only way this could happen is if the lightning flash wasn't at full intensity. He might have caught the very tail end of a strike just before it completely disappears, or it may have been a distant strike. The version above certainly looks like it has had some values adjusted, but pretty much every digital photographer does that, especially in low-light situations.

[AutoPenalti]

1 person found dead according to WP.

No argument here that Harvey should be retired after this.

[ColdMiser123]

Stunning and horrifying to see the kind of damage coming from Rockport.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiuJMxr ... e=youtu.be

[Callista]

What really bugs me about weather coverage is that they always focus on the worst of the damage. You never get a proper survey of a broad area, with both strong and weak buildings, woodframe and concrete. They focus on what's usually the path of a tornado, or a trailer park, or whatever looks particularly newsworthy. They don't understand that people would really like to get a decent idea of what the average building looks like--not the worst there is.

[tolakram]

What really bugs me about weather coverage is that they always focus on the worst of the damage. You never get a proper survey of a broad area, with both strong and weak buildings, woodframe and concrete. They focus on what's usually the path of a tornado, or a trailer park, or whatever looks particularly newsworthy. They don't understand that people would really like to get a decent idea of what the average building looks like--not the worst there is.

These reports will be published but they take a while to generate and you will have to seek them out. Instant reporting, as we're seeing today, is going to focus on the worst.

[PTPatrick]

I must admit the lack of apparent cat 4 damage is intriguing but not surprising, max sustained wind rarely mixes down over land beyond the immediate beach. It seems to more in situations like this where it strengthens close to the coast, still not very easily. This is compounded by relative lack population in the areas that would have gotten the maximum wind. We can all go find pictures of tin roofs and old shoddy structures and warehouses knocked down and about after cat 2's. Make no mistake a 4 is a 4, and the rain will be horrific. But people get wrapped around the axel about this stuff and it's just the nature of storms, no 2 are alike...topography, angle of approach toward a coast, population of landfall area, and the myriad of things going on the atmosphere play a huge role is the eventual onshore effects. For folks effected I'm sure it sucks plenty bad. They are especially fortunate with low end surge...absent true sustained cat 4/5 wind that is what razes whole neighborhoods.

Aside from extensive Arkansas/rockport damage this storm is going to be remembered for rain. It can't be underestimated. When I was in school a tropical feeder band parked over Tallahassee for an evening...10 inches and few hours later I was wading through my apartment and people died when cars were sucked into storm ditches.

[tolakram]

Have we seen pictures from Seadrift yet? Port Aransas was not in the worst part of the storm, the NE eyewall came in east of there IMO. Port Aransas should have less damage than Rockport, for example.

[ronyan]

I'm expecting very high rainfall totals here tonight into tomorrow based on the short range models. Hopefully the drainage system can take it. Never have come close to getting water in the house.

[sponger]

I must admit the lack of apparent cat 4 damage is intriguing but not surprising, max sustained wind rarely mixes down over land beyond the immediate beach. It seems to more in situations like this where it strengthens close to the coast, still not very easily. This is compounded by relative lack population in the areas that would have gotten the maximum wind. We can all go find pictures of tin roofs and old shoddy structures and warehouses knocked down and about after cat 2's. Make no mistake a 4 is a 4, and the rain will be horrific. But people get wrapped around the axel about this stuff and it's just the nature of storms, no 2 are alike...topography, angle of approach toward a coast, population of landfall area, and the myriad of things going on the atmosphere play a huge role is the eventual onshore effects. For folks effected I'm sure it sucks plenty bad. They are especially fortunate with low end surge...absent true sustained cat 4/5 wind that is what razes whole neighborhoods.

Aside from extensive Arkansas/rockport damage this storm is going to be remembered for rain. It can't be underestimated. When I was in school a tropical feeder band parked over Tallahassee for an evening...10 inches and few hours later I was wading through my apartment and people died when cars were sucked into storm ditches.

Go Noles! I lived across from TCC when we found out 600 acres drained into our complex. A car was in 5 feet of water in 90 minutes!

[Andrew92]

I've seen enough pictures of Rockport after the storm. This was bad enough, no less where else there is damage close by.

-Andrew92

[tolakram]

 https://twitter.com/StormVisuals/status/901500988791586817

[swampgator92]

What really bugs me about weather coverage is that they always focus on the worst of the damage. You never get a proper survey of a broad area, with both strong and weak buildings, woodframe and concrete. They focus on what's usually the path of a tornado, or a trailer park, or whatever looks particularly newsworthy. They don't understand that people would really like to get a decent idea of what the average building looks like--not the worst there is.

Yes. This. Exactly. I like to see the science and facts and not the hype. It's actually dangerous to overhype these storms. It gives people a false sense of security. People will now think they survived a Cat 4 storm with a few shingles off their roof when actually they experienced Cat 2 winds because they were on the weaker side of the eyewall. Wilma hit South Florida as a Cat 3 but all the sustained winds were in the Cat 1 and Cat 2 range and that caused a ton of damage.

[sponger]

What really bugs me about weather coverage is that they always focus on the worst of the damage. You never get a proper survey of a broad area, with both strong and weak buildings, woodframe and concrete. They focus on what's usually the path of a tornado, or a trailer park, or whatever looks particularly newsworthy. They don't understand that people would really like to get a decent idea of what the average building looks like--not the worst there is.

Yes. This. Exactly. I like to see the science and facts and not the hype. It's actually dangerous to overhype these storms. It gives people a false sense of security. People will now think they survived a Cat 4 storm with a few shingles off their roof when actually they experienced Cat 2 winds because they were on the weaker side of the eyewall. Wilma hit South Florida as a Cat 3 but all the sustained winds were in the Cat 1 and Cat 2 range and that caused a ton of damage.

A lot of that was the interaction with the cold front causing on off on gusting winds. I drove down that night with a generator for my Dad and was astounded at the damage. Drove from Melborne to Margate in the dark, over 2 hours!

[tolakram]

What really bugs me about weather coverage is that they always focus on the worst of the damage. You never get a proper survey of a broad area, with both strong and weak buildings, woodframe and concrete. They focus on what's usually the path of a tornado, or a trailer park, or whatever looks particularly newsworthy. They don't understand that people would really like to get a decent idea of what the average building looks like--not the worst there is.

Yes. This. Exactly. I like to see the science and facts and not the hype. It's actually dangerous to overhype these storms. It gives people a false sense of security. People will now think they survived a Cat 4 storm with a few shingles off their roof when actually they experienced Cat 2 winds because they were on the weaker side of the eyewall. Wilma hit South Florida as a Cat 3 but all the sustained winds were in the Cat 1 and Cat 2 range and that caused a ton of damage.

If you are interested in the science and facts then it should come as no surprise to you that areas outside of the strongest eyewall received less than cat 4 winds. If this was not a cat 4 the winds would have been even less, right? I'm not seeing hype, I'm seeing photos of damage. If someone has a photo of a trailer park with the caption 'horrible cat 4 damage' then I would agree, hype.

I am unable to judge category damage from twitter pics. I'll wait and let the experts decide.

[tolakram]

 https://twitter.com/hurricanetrack/status/901489385723580416