Posted on 10/22/2005 6:51:32 PM PDT by gusopol3
The atmosphere as of Saturday holds potential for the development of a powerful storm off the Atlantic Seaboard of the United States early next week. While this would be true to some extent without the existence of Hurricane Wilma and the newly-dubbed Tropical Storm Alpha, which represent a great reservoir of tropical warmth and moisture, it only ratchets up the potential. Two players here are key. First, a sharply dipping jet stream will be thrusting southward from central Canada and tapping a cold pool to spin up low pressure south of the Great Lakes Sunday and Monday. The other player, none other than Hurricane Wilma, will pull away from Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula in time for a crossing of the Florida Peninsula Monday. It is Monday night and Tuesday when things could get crazy in the meteorological sense. The strong northeast-trending jet stream will scoop up Wilma, with possible contribution from Alpha, as the low shifts from the Appalachians to the coast. If Wilma were to follow the western edges of its forecast window and begin to draw in the cool low from the west, an explosive deepening could result, culminating in a deep and fully merged storm raging south of Nova Scotia Wednesday. While this is not the most likely scenario, it is one that is in the realm of possibility. This is what could happen Monday night and Tuesday if our Worst Case Scenario came to pass. Heavy, driving rains and gales would pound the Seaboard from North Carolina to southern New England. As the rains spread northwards and the storm tapped the cold pole from the west, rain would turn to heavy wet snow over the inland Northeast. Keep checking back with us at AccuWeather.com Weather Headlines to see what the latest is on this interesting, even serious, weather situation.
It's possible for hurricanes to merge. There's some disruption in the air flow as they collide, but the low pressures just continue the vortex and the winds smooth out again.
That storm almost got me (although before the book we just called it the Halloween Storm)....I surf and looking at the map knew that Montauk would be huge...it was with only one reef able to handle the size and direction, the spot at the Lighthouse called the Alamo....12-15 ft faces...long story short, I got in trouble and nearly paid a lot more than it was worth...the same day a surfer was drowned by the swell in Rhode Island.
Here's an historical example, albeit not a very impressive one. Check out TS Karen, it was absorbed by Iris in 1995.
http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/1995_Atlantic_hurricane_season
Wow, I'm glad your okay. That must be quite a story to tell.
I saw the movie and it was okay, I really felt for the families since it was based on a true story.
That movie reminded me of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
yup. and it was one of the worst storms here on long island and in new england, worse then many hurricanes.
That is very unkind of you, to wish a big sneeze on me, but I am trying very hard not to laugh, because that hurts too!
Wasn't one of the storms off the Great Lakes?
Whoa!
This is supposed to happen. . .
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATCDAT5+shtml/230228.shtml?
Look at the forcast at the bottom:
INITIAL 23/0300Z 17.7N 70.1W 45 KT
12HR VT 23/1200Z 18.9N 71.5W 30 KT...INLAND
24HR VT 24/0000Z 22.0N 72.5W 30 KT...OVER WATER
36HR VT 24/1200Z 26.0N 73.0W 30 KT...DISSIPATING
48HR VT 25/0000Z...ABSORBED WITHIN CIRCULATION OF WILMA
Two tropical systems merging never result in one system stronger than either of the two original systems. Basically the weaker one is annihilated, and the stronger one isn't any stronger than it would have been alone.
There's an immense amount of misunderstanding and mythology about the perfect storm; it really wasn't all that much of a merger; what was unusual about it was it moving westwards while off of Nova Scotia.
It was a completely non-tropical Noreaster in every way.
However, AFTER it had done all of it's damage, sunk the Andrea gale, and moved SW to off of New Jersey, a tropical system formed in the middle of it; the so called "Unnamed Hurricane" (NHC deliberately didn't name it in order not to confuse the public, a long and complicated story.)
"Or the weaker will be sucked into the stronger."
Uh, in other words uh... merging?
The main reason that the tropical storm moved west was a closed low (noreaster) sitting at 40N 70W which usually happens a couple times each fall and winter. It happened to coincide with the tropical system and threw the tropical system back at the coast.
The difference this time is there is no strong upper low diving southeast from Canada to close off off the coast. Everything will keep moving and no matter how strong Wilma is (970MB) the storm will last 6-12 hours at most.
Actually I think it's a matter of terminology that you "mergers" are using here. You act as though when the 2 storms meet as a "merger" it turns into one, big super storm. That does'nt happen. And it is'nt a merger. It is one storm actually dominated the airspace that the second storm cannot survive. The second storm does'nt increase nor does it enhance the larger storm except maybe introduce more moisture.
But they both cannot live off the same hot water simultaniously. After a storm passes, it uses up the hot water for energy, if 2 storms collide they more likely bounce off of each other. It is much more likely that the larger storm will "eat" up the smaller but it does'nt increase it's strength because of it. Hot water and low shear allows a storm to breathe and get stronger.
One of the storms will be unemployed???
In October of 87 two low pressure systems (essentially hurricanes) merged just before giving the mainland of Great Britain the worst storm they had had in 100 years.
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