ATL: MICHAEL - Post-Tropical - Discussion

[yzerfan]

Anyone see footage of Cape San Blas? I'm sure they were hit very hard with wind and storm surge and I'm guessing it looks a lot like Mexico Beach.

Haven't yet, but I know it's going to be bad. The whole peninsula is so low elevation.

[Steve]

I am still trying to wrap my mind around this. A little over 72 hours ago this was suppose to be a tropical storm/low end hurricane along the Gulf coast. It never stopped strengthening since day one. Made a run at category 5 off the coast of the Florida panhandle.

Michael might be one of the biggest weather phenomenons I'll ever see.

You might be surprised to know that the strengthening was telegraphed by the upper pattern in advance. Models don’t always catch that. But the north Gulf was primed. I don’t think anyone would have guessed it would go all the way to the borderline of a 4/5, but many posters pointed pointed it out this weekend and early week. Whenever there is that type of upper pattern ahead, it’s usualy just a matter of time.

[Hurrilurker]

Even if you managed to escape severe destruction, just imagine how long it's going to take just to get a window replaced. There's probably tens of thousands of broken windows and not enough glass or labor in the whole state to fix them for a while.

[Steve]

Mexico beach Facebook page made me sick. So many people stayed and are missing. Even some in the pictures of whole buildings that are gone. Rustic Palms RV and campground had so many people who stayed in trailers.

That’s a giant wt*? scenario. You don’t stay in a freaking campground or RV Park with a Category 1 coming at you.

[1900hurricane]

Just for comparison's sake, the KZC analysis I did with the 919 mb pressure yields an intensity estimate of about 140 kt.

 https://twitter.com/1900hurricane/status/1050122810801176588

[chaser1]

Yet, there's been no reports of any found bodies or deaths from there??

Not to be cryptic, but I believe it's only a matter of time. We hope for the best but seeing the images from Panama City Beach eastward...it'd be hard surviving that.

Surge, big wind, weak structures..that isnt a good combination, lets hope loss of life is minimal

You guys could be right. Sure hope that's not the case. I could certainly imagine a worse case scenario where people right on the coast could perish as a result of the failure, inundation, and destruction caused by the storm surge itself. The only thing that makes me suspect (or hope) that did not actually occur is this. If a number of structure and mobile homes were too suddenly succumb to the sea, it seems rational that some loss of life would sadly occur. In light of that possibly occurring, what would be the odds of all those people not suddenly reacting, jumping out of their beds, and at least try to escape to any other structure or higher ground, or somehow survive the traumatic event by clinging to pieces of debris, a tree, or something. Even if a number of people were somehow swept out to see, amidst the rubble wouldn't there have to be a least one or two people seemingly found? Just hard to imagine that so many would perish but even stranger that so many (or nearly "all") just end up missing. Guess one has to hope that most did finally elect to go in the night and are somewhere safe. Up to now, this has largely been an unexpected and scary episode to contend with, an event costing many a lot of money and for others everything that they own, and certainly a bizarre spectacle of tropical meteorology. In the end though, this may turn out to be the tragic exclamation mark that'll best define how history will ultimately label Hurricane Michael; A historic disaster rather then a historic event.

[Steve]

https://twitter.com/USAFCCF/status/1050139034339762176

Edit that’s the building across the street fekm the high rise. I know a wonderful title attorney who’s office is there.

[Blown Away]

Even if you managed to escape severe destruction, just imagine how long it's going to take just to get a window replaced. There's probably tens of thousands of broken windows and not enough glass or labor in the whole state to fix them for a while.

Fortunately the hardest hit areas have relatively small populations so getting materials to them will be easier if Mike had hit SFL, City of West Palm Beach has more people than all those small communities combined...

[sbcc]

Mexico beach Facebook page made me sick. So many people stayed and are missing. Even some in the pictures of whole buildings that are gone. Rustic Palms RV and campground had so many people who stayed in trailers.

That’s a giant wt*? scenario. You don’t stay in a freaking campground or RV Park with a Category 1 coming at you.

My relatives moved their seasonal trailer park lot from the Bonita area well inland to Hendry County. They don't stay there during hurricane season, but they wanted to increase the chances their park model would survive each storm. So far, so good.

[chaser1]

:uarrow:

Very strong language being used here..

Yeah, I kinda thought he'd go with something stronger like "it'll need fixing"

[jdjaguar]

That's something you expect to see in a storm like Andrew or Camille

https://twitter.com/NimbusStorms/status/1050137995255398402

Or a storm like Michael

[Craters]

https://twitter.com/GarofaloWX/status/1050178849273593856

Wow, that is really scary, especially because that type of building -- brick school gymnasium -- is often used as shelter space.

I know wide, expansive spaces like that are considered bad shelter in a tornado, but could that be the same in a hurricane?

To my admittedly untrained eye, that does look like tornado damage. I wonder if that's what caused it...

[supercane4867]

Just for comparison's sake, the KZC analysis I did with the 919 mb pressure yields an intensity estimate of about 140 kt.

https://twitter.com/1900hurricane/status/1050122810801176588

Given the frequency of KZC being used in post-season analysis these days, I’m pretty confident that Michael will get the upgrade

[sbcc]

Wow, that is really scary, especially because that type of building -- brick school gymnasium -- is often used as shelter space.

I know wide, expansive spaces like that are considered bad shelter in a tornado, but could that be the same in a hurricane?

To my admittedly untrained eye, that does look like tornado damage. I wonder if that's what caused it...

To that end, I watched all of Brett Adair's footage and he was pointing out multiple vorticies on the road in front of him. There were mesovorticies in the eyewall. Did one of those pass over/through this school? Though I think a sustained 130+ wind speed could do the same damage depending on construction.

[cycloneye]

 https://twitter.com/RyanMaue/status/1050193960348672000

[nascarfan999]

Catastraphic wind damage in Panama City. Very impressive consider they were in weaker side of eyewall

https://i.imgur.com/TnW8fv7.jpg

Before image of the firestone building. Of note, you can't see it well in the after, but the building itself is primarily brick. Also, note that the edge of the building lined up pretty close to the edge of the asphalt parking lot, so the whole roof was shifted several feet off the building.

https://goo.gl/maps/gmJqeMNWJoH2

[jlauderdal]

They are looking for the next model run that shows development

I was thinking the same thing, but then realized this. Those who were up all night tracking and analyzing Michael's Sat pic's and data, are probably taking a "brain break". Those who chased it, are probably asleep. Those who directly faced the prospect of loosing their home, property and loved ones from the harrowing threat, are probably drinking heavily.
Finally, that leaves both you and I. We obviously have no life.

I'm not gonna lie; I was kinda wondering about that new area of low pressure expected to form in the W. Caribbean in the days to come

Models did well with the genesis of michael, will see if they crank one more out to close the season ...navgem and hwrf were very good the last few days but even hwrf undershot intensity and it is usually the one overcooking..nhc nailed the track but intensity forecasting is still very challanging for the computers and humans..hopefully people in evacuation zones that stayed did ok..however, people in non evac really struggled with this system and their relatively weak structures

[chaser1]

https://twitter.com/RyanMaue/status/1050169312001097730

Isn't that just SO like that one relative many of us have? They rarely come but visit for just a couple of hours when they do. Then "poof". They grab a full tank of clouds, and off like a thief in the night. Merrily avoiding the busy rush hour while keen to any speed traps on I-75 along the way.

[caneman]

I am still trying to wrap my mind around this. A little over 72 hours ago this was suppose to be a tropical storm/low end hurricane along the Gulf coast. It never stopped strengthening since day one. Made a run at category 5 off the coast of the Florida panhandle.

Michael might be one of the biggest weather phenomenons I'll ever see.

You might be surprised to know that the strengthening was telegraphed by the upper pattern in advance. Models don’t always catch that. But the north Gulf was primed. I don’t think anyone would have guessed it would go all the way to the borderline of a 4/5, but many posters pointed pointed it out this weekend and early week. Whenever there is that type of upper pattern ahead, it’s usualy just a matter of time.

There will be a lot of lessons learned from this. The shear maps so many rely on must have been flat out wrong or some phenomenon unknown to many now created a counter balance. Yes, most models agreed in the end it would be a major but we've all come to know not to count on intensity models. I've lived on the gulf for 40 years, I see most storms just hold their own or weaken some in the face of a front, I most certainly wouldn't expect strengthening especially given time of year and history as well. I'm not a betting man but given all those thing, I would have bet on hold your own or weaken. Turns out I would have lost big.
This storm will be studied in meteorology classrooms for decades to come. My namesake is Michael so I thought it was cool at first but not now.

[aperson]

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10 ... F2222369.1
Title: Tropical Cyclone Intensity Change before U.S. Gulf Coast Landfall

Extracts:

Tropical storms and depressions strengthened on average by about 7 kt for every 12 h over the Gulf, except for little change during their final 12 h before landfall. Hurricanes underwent a different systematic evolution. In the net, category 1–2 hurricanes strengthened, while category 3–5 hurricanes weakened such that tropical cyclones approach the threshold of major hurricane status by U.S. landfall. This behavior can be partially explained by consideration of the maximum potential intensity modified by the environmental vertical wind shear and hurricane-induced sea surface temperature reduction near the storm center associated with relatively low oceanic heat content levels.

“Rapid intensification,” or RI, when systems intensify by at least 30 kt (about two SSHWS categories) in 24 h, occurs about 6% of the time (Kaplan et al. 2010) and rarely, if ever, is forecast accurately by the NHC.

A comparison of the atmospheric variables between the two groups [non-major and major hurricanes] showed that there were no significant differences in the 200-hPa temperature and divergence from 0 to 36 h. The average vertical shear, however, was lower and the low-level RH was higher along the storm tracks at all time periods from 0 to 36 h for the MH cases. This result indicates that the atmospheric variables were actually more favorable for the MH cases, and does not explain why those storms tended to weaken while the NMHs continued to intensify.

Emphasis mine on the quotes. Note that Michael was under moderate shear throughout most of its life. However, if we consider the direction and divergence of the shear, it was not oriented to maximize destructive interference. See:


This will be an extremely interesting system in post analysis.