Perfect Season

[BigA]

Personally, I think a perfect season might include a weak tropical storm making landfall on the central Texas coast and causing a nice amount of rain in south central Texas. They certainly need it.

[somethingfunny]

If Bill Gates has succeded than we will begin to notice even more weird patterns in the Atlantic weather and climate and there will be a great ecological impact, but I really doubt it

We've barely gotten out of the 70s here in North Texas this past week. That is WIERD. Same with the Great American Tornado Drought of 2009 and the global tropical cyclone drought currently going on. It is hotter in Seattle than it is in Dallas. Heck, it may be hotter in Fairbanks.

If we had the hypothetical perfect season with a very low ACE for the entire Northern Hemisphere, our weather will only get stranger. Hurricanes serve a purpose by transferring heat energy from the tropics to the middle and polar latitudes....a year without hurricanes would probably cause complete chaos in the upper latitudes....

I think Ana is just around the corner actually. Within two weeks we'll (maybe) be tracking both Ana and Bill.

[clfenwi]

I wonder if there end up being no named storms at all in the Atlantic if the govt will take away any funding for hurricane research? No hurricanes= perception that the danger is gone. Spend the money on something else....until another Katrina or Andrew comes along and spoils the party. We'd better hope that A) hurricanes have become extinct and we just don't know it or B) several of them form and get close enough to land areas to warrant a need for continued research, recon and plans to deal with them when they do hit. Because if they have not gone extinct, one will hit land sooner or later and people will want to know as much as they can about the intensity, etc. Right? Perhaps Bill Gates has succeeded and we just have not heard it yet.

While it may be somewhat harder for new initiatives to get money, I don't think the government isn't so reactionary that it would cut existing research funding. Especially, when it's done under the guise of climate change research.

To me, the "problem" that a quiet season poses for researchers of the present and future, to some extent* is the lack of new study material. The upshot of 2005 was the number of close-in storms that the NOAA P-3s were able to fly in and more than enough case studies to go around for grad students to chew on, etc.

* Trying to explain why a disturbance didn't form can be as fruitful as explaining why one formed, and so on. Also, not a bad thing in the long term if students do their math homework instead of staring at satellite loops.

[brunota2003]

Speaking of funding...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090 ... hy/3280872

[cycloneye]

The biggest problem of a quiet season is that the public may turn away from following the tropics as a sense of complancency rises and that could result in dire things occuring when a strong hurricane is a threat to any area.

[psyclone]

to me the idea of a 0 storm season is so goofy it doesn't even warrant discussion. it's like a lotto player quitting their job before the numbers are drawn. a concept i think is more interesting to contemplate is the later we go before the first storm, the higher the probability that storm will be a whopper instead of the typical sheared clunker we often expect the first storm to be. things will change soon so enjoy the worry free downtime.

[Brent]

This thread is completely useless... July 29th and the prospect of no named storms? Seriously?





I give it 2 weeks at most before Ana forms.

[Stormcenter]

Well I'll say this if in two weeks we still don't have a named storm
then I doubt if we'll even come close to seeing double digit number
of named storms this season.

[Frank2]

I agree with stormcenter - it only makes sense that the later the first storm forms, the lower the total number...

As psyclone's "the later the storm the better chance for a whopper", that usually is not the case, if ever - it just means the first storm forms later...

P.S. I didn't say that the "perfect season" was something certain to happen - in fact, as mentioned earlier, the chance of a season without any named storms is very low, but it's interesting to think about the possibility, given the drought of tornadoes that the Vortex2 folks "found"...

Chances are that we will have something to look at in the next few weeks (or less), but as NOAA has mentioned, it also depends on the strength of the current El Nino and how that affects the season as a whole - so far the tropics have the "activity" of an El Nino season, that's for certain...

I recall the El Nino seasons of the early 1980's, and how the NHC would feel like a firehouse without a fire, with the usual comments "it so quiet", etc., but in the end it was just quiet - nothing abnormal happened as a result of the lack of hurricanes - other than the fact that there weren't very many of them...

Frank

[KWT]

Actually Frank I did a little bit of studying and found out that nearly half of all cat-5s have come from seasons that have started later then the 20th of July, or late starters IMO that have thier first PURE tropical storm (ie not subtropical) after the 20th July.

I'll get the list up soon. If you think about it its logical given less storms means less upwelling and therefore a greater amount of heat content present and if a strom can get decent conditions then things obviously go bang, where if there has been a few storms in that region already it may mean that same system can only get upto a cat-4.

[DESTRUCTION5]

IMO We should and would already have 2 named systems in any other year...If they would have named the Azores storm and Carolina storm in late May and early June like they usually do.

[Frank2]

Sure, that makes sense - no upwelling means warmer water and the chance for a stronger system if one does comes along...

By the way, per the other topic on this board, the wave about to exit Africa looks pretty formidable (though it is a little on the "high" side in latitude)...

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/eumet/eatl/loop-avn.html

[KWT]

Right here is the list, so many memorable hurricanes in this list.
Remember this is the seasons which have had thier first pure tropical storm (subs don't count in this list) on either the 20th July or later:

1928: Okeechobee
1935: Labor day
1938: New England
1947: Fort Lauderdale
1950: Dog
1955: Janet
1961: Carla and Hattie
1967: Beulah
1969: Camille
1977: Anita
1980: Allen
1988: Gilbert
1992: Andrew
1998: Mitch
2004: Ivan

16 category-5s in that list, pretty impressive total, however obviously before the 60s the data could be a little dodgy.

Of course I know what you mean Frank, could just as easily see a season that has no imapct at all from any storms as it is to see a season like 1992, etc.

[Macrocane]

Thanks for the list KWT, I just wanted to add wich of those were El Niño years:
1969
1977
1992
2004

[Sanibel]

1992 had no activity until Andrew slammed south Florida. 1914 had a TS track into southern Georgia. The flat trackers of the past few years finally lifted slightly into the GOM after having a weird south dip near the Bahamas like Ike. I think if you generally compute these track tendencies, and 2009 stays inactive into late August, the track tendency suggests east coast of Florida to SE coast with Florida being the weightier target because of last year's tracks. Mostly unscientific of course.

[Category 5]

There will be named storms, but the back of my mind wants us to go 0/0/0. Because I'm getting great laughs from the talkin tropics forum so far this season.

[Frank2]

Max must have read this topic (LOL):

http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/we ... n_a_s.html

[Category 5]

and another

[KWT]

Well from 0/0/0 to possibly 3/1/1 by Tuesday?
Maybe even 4 if the wave behind Bill develops as the models are somewhat suggesting.

[Frank2]

Cat 5,

Well, it'd still be perfect if there are no landfalling systems, so there...

=D

P.S. KWT, it's amazing how quickly things can change, that's for sure...