ATL: LAURA - Post-Tropical - Discussion

[Nuno]

All I know is this depression is depressing me!

I personally find this stage of a cyclone's life fascinating. I love how complex it is. Usually more interesting than some straight forward cat 2 that's undergone partial EWRC and has ingested copious amounts of dry air

[SFLcane]

And there is your king.

[ozonepete]

All the "But Dorian" posts here are going to look foolish in a few days when we have an open wave going through the Bahamas. Recon confirms there's no circulation as all the winds are out of the southeast and the favorable conditions down the road aren't going to matter if all you have is an open wave scraping the north end of the islands, something that is a distinct possibility--NHC even points out their forecast is highly uncertain.

This is not Dorian, which was never in this bad of shape and most of the posts refer to down the road conditions, not the current state of things. Dorian was always expected to weaken based on the models (most of which poorly initialized it due to it's small size, similarly with Danny in 2015), which was what never happened.

I can easily point to Karen last year when people were insistent it would reorganize just like Dorian because of those favorable conditions, and that of course played out differently.

Everyone here should start to realize that most bold predictions here are made by people who still need to learn, after all these years, that a slow, steady and careful analysis is the best guide to a good forecast. It took me a few painful years of sticking my neck out and then getting it chopped off here to realize that using your gut or comparing one storm to past storms is almost a guarantee for a bust. And if you are fairly far off from the NHC within the next 3 or4 days then it's you that's probably wrong, not them.

Right now Cat 3 or open wave here are both sticking your neck way out.

[hipshot]

pk they are heading in for a pass..
down to 780 gpm operational altitude.

What is "gpm"?

[eastcoastFL]

Playing the "this person said that last year" game is a unnecessary, slippery slope. Destin, I could point out the numerous hyperbolic flip-flopping statements you said in the week leading up to Isaias passing by Florida, but that wouldn't really contribute anything to the current situation. I think that's a game better left unplayed. No one is perfect. 95% of us here are amateurs. It would help if everyone tones down the hyperbole, the model wars, and the "gotcha" mentality.

He made a valid point that people have said the EXACT same comments just a year ago. Point being is nothing is set in stone and the gfs/euro are not the end all be all.

[Aric Dunn]

pk they are heading in for a pass..
down to 780 gpm operational altitude.

What is "gpm"?

geopotential meters.

[ozonepete]

pk they are heading in for a pass..
down to 780 gpm operational altitude.

What is "gpm"?

Geopotential meters. height above the surface.

[HurricaneEdouard]

Anyone want to take bets on whether this or Fourteen will become Laura? NHC has backed off from storm in 12 hours, so they're leaning into Fourteen now.

These are kind of funny but they're made with the benefit of hindsight. everyone is going to be inaccurate. In fairness, Dorian's survival was very much in doubt in the east caribbean. The NHC forecasts kind of split the difference with a rather modest intensity in the early outlooks (sound familiar?). For every case such as this we can find many more where the hype squad pushed a dud that failed to blossom. Will they be held to the same standards? I doubt it. I'm surprised i didn't get scorched on this list....as i distinctly recall tilting toward dissipation in the carib...although i expected a big hurricane if it survived to the Bahamas. It's really astonishingly similar to what is going on now. Speaking more broadly Dorian and 13 remind us how often the tropics are almost a coin toss in some cases. I'd suggest the coin is in the air again and the official forecast kind of splits the difference. Acknowledgement of low confidence is a bit of nod to this phenomenon. The NHC gang sure has my respect.

I don't post here too much, but as a long-time (since '05) lurker, I always thought, in a purely friendly and humorous (not argumentative or gotcha) way, with much love for all the many different flavours of contributors and their approach to the tropics, it might be a fun tradition to "bring out the receipts" as part of a recap at the end of a storm thread or a season. Mostly just for the sake of fun, although helping users calibrate our bulls and our bears might be helpful. Seeing how the Storm2K groupmind reacts to storms is precisely why I love browsing through the old storm archives (Wilma, Epsilon and 2005 in general are particularly fascinating reads); I'm not a known name here, but from an outsider's perspective, I think the bonds in this community are strong precisely because we're all a familiar family of hurricane nerds applying our different perspectives and our traditional reactions to the tropics, and there's something very entertaining about being part of that (which is why we're here, posting rather than keeping our thoughts to ourselves!).

[chaser1]

Not saying this is the same situation overall, especially being a green enthusiast, I could be way off base...but you could delete all of these posts and replace it with the first 15+ pages of the Dorian thread from last year and you"d be hard pressed to see a difference. Satellite appearance, location, similar SAL/Dry air and shear. Even the immediate track. Only real difference was Dorians microwave presentation seemed much better at this point.

I don't think you're way off but that same argument could probably be made by doing the same with Isaias' thread. Look how that slop turned out. Just goes to show how tricky forecasting is

Conditions past the Islands will be much more similar to Dorian than Isaias conditions.

That may well be true but it is far from an absolute given. Myself and others have considered the potential impact that TD 14 outflow might have on TD 13. I have my own thoughts but it's too early to say. Just as far out in time as we are now, forecasters anticipated Dorian to reach a particular strength but that was vastly exceeded. All that say's is that forecasters perceive conditions to be one way or another. They're correct.... right up until they're wrong

[HurricaneEdouard]

Everyone here should start to realize that most bold predictions here are made by people who still need to learn, after all these years, that a slow, steady and careful analysis is the best guide to a good forecast. It took me a few painful years of sticking my neck out and then getting it chopped off here to realize that using your gut or comparing one storm to past storms is almost a guarantee for a bust. And if you are fairly far off from the NHC within the next 3 or4 days then it's you that's probably wrong, not them.

Right now Cat 3 or open wave here are both sticking your neck way out.

Agreed. Those who hug any particular model should remember the NHC forecast is still the most reliable of them all (or was last time I saw a graph comparing average forecast error, anyway, which was admittedly a few years ago).

[Hypercane_Kyle]

Slightly off topic, but i'd like to share some posts from last year's Dorian thread to remind people that this can easily strengthen.
There are some striking similarities. The GFS/Euro didn't like Dorian early on either, the HWRF/HMON did.
Not saying this is going to be a cat 5. All I am saying is think big picture before you call this off.

No offense meant to these posters at all.
Here are some posts from the Dorian threads:

"Dry sinking airmass will probably prevent this system from developing the euro just poofs it as it nears the islands."
- SFLcane, August 23, 2019.

"The euro happens to have completely screwed this one up so far. Not sure we should be trusting it for this particular system."
- NikhilTri, August 23, 2019.

"Good news this morning if this even develops it will more then likely be decapitated as it nears the islands. Conditions just are not favorable overall"
- SFLcane, August 24, 2019.

"I do have some doubts about that NHC forecast verifying. I don't think the intensity models are really taking into account its size and how much dry air/wind shear TD5 will be facing."
- Hurricane_Kyle, August 24, 2019.

"I would forecast it to be dissipating in the NE Caribbean, not a hurricane. Using HWRF for intensity guidance????"
- wxman57, August 24, 2019.

"I'm betting the NHC thinks the global models have a poor handle on the system, which makes sense considering the ECMWF hardly even showed a vortex, let alone a TC, until like yesterday for Dorian."
- Hurricane_Kyle, August 24, 2019.

"I do wonder if the GFS is too struggling now with the size of Dorian. If conditions are favorable until the islands then why doesn’t it strengthen it much?"
- TheStormExpert, August 24, 2019.

"GFS/Euro basically do nothing with Dorian, hard to go against those models..."
-Blown Away, August 25, 2019.

Heh. I still suffer some sort of PTSD from the Dorian fiasco. What a wild ride.

[TheStormExpert]

 https://twitter.com/webberweather/status/1296581522733113344

[Hammy]

Playing the "this person said that last year" game is a unnecessary, slippery slope. Destin, I could point out the numerous hyperbolic flip-flopping statements you said in the week leading up to Isaias passing by Florida, but that wouldn't really contribute anything to the current situation. I think that's a game better left unplayed. No one is perfect. 95% of us here are amateurs. It would help if everyone tones down the hyperbole, the model wars, and the "gotcha" mentality.

He made a valid point that people have said the EXACT same comments just a year ago. Point being is nothing is set in stone and the gfs/euro are not the end all be all.

That would be all well and good if the HWRF and like weren't similarly being pointed to in such a matter of fact set in stone manner. The fact is that the organization right now is atrocious, and as some of the mets here have pointed out, it's surprising they went with an upgrade last night in the first place rather than PTC.

[eastcoastFL]

I suck at reading recon data but did I see 39kt winds? Or was it FL?

[eastcoastFL]

Playing the "this person said that last year" game is a unnecessary, slippery slope. Destin, I could point out the numerous hyperbolic flip-flopping statements you said in the week leading up to Isaias passing by Florida, but that wouldn't really contribute anything to the current situation. I think that's a game better left unplayed. No one is perfect. 95% of us here are amateurs. It would help if everyone tones down the hyperbole, the model wars, and the "gotcha" mentality.

He made a valid point that people have said the EXACT same comments just a year ago. Point being is nothing is set in stone and the gfs/euro are not the end all be all.

That would be all well and good if the HWRF and like weren't similarly being pointed to in such a matter of fact set in stone manner. The fact is that the organization right now is atrocious, and as some of the mets here have pointed out, it's surprising they went with an upgrade last night in the first place rather than PTC.

Nobody I’ve seen has pointed to HWRF as set in stone. I’ve just seen people totally disregarding things because the euro says no development. HWRF though has out performed the big boys in the past and this season. I hate to see it totally tossed out when it nailed both Irma and Dorian. It’s worth using as a tool. Obviously the nhc isn’t putting much weight into the euro right now.

[eastcoastFL]

Never mind I see surface winds capping out around 23kts

I suck at reading recon data but did I see 39kt winds? Or was it FL?

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/recon/recon_NOAA3-0113A-CYCLONE.png

[Blown Away]

pk they are heading in for a pass..
down to 780 gpm operational altitude.

What is "gpm"?

geopotential meters.

Aric, where is the center? NHC choose not to follow what you posted on visible earlier. The certainly was a vigorous circulation mostly naked, but had some pops around it. It seems the 18z models are initializing farther SW?

[TheDreamTraveler]

:spam:

https://twitter.com/webberweather/status/1296581522733113344

Came here to post this. Euro might actually be right on it. Doesn't mean it won't ever develop...but I don't think most of us expected this to develop anytime soon anyway. Well except the people who were saying this was another Andrew lol

[Aric Dunn]

What is "gpm"?

geopotential meters.

Aric, where is the center? NHC choose not to follow what you posted on visible earlier. The certainly was a vigorous circulation mostly naked, but had some pops around it. It seems the 18z models are initializing farther SW?

It was close. from their discussion it sounds like they are expecting multiple vorts. so their center fix was likely just a continuation from the previous advisory until recon got there. but as far as the center now..

that llc from earlier is what they are flying around. so we will see soon. I hope they fly farther south as well just to check.

but who knows these days.

[Aric Dunn]

just an FYI shear is going to drop off fast over night.