TD 2 forms in the Atlantic; hundreds feared dead from Typhoon Morakot; Felicia hits
Tropical Depression Two has formed out of the strong tropical wave off the coast of Africa we've been watching, and has a good chance of becoming the Atlantic hurricane season's first named storm. Satellite loops of the storm show that heavy thunderstorm activity is increasing near the storm's center, and low-level spiral bands are getting better established. However, dry air to TD 2's north is interfering with this process, and the storm is being slow to organize. This morning's QuikSCAT pass missed TD 2.
Figure 1. Current satellite image of TD 2.
Wind shear over the storm is low, 5 knots, and is expected to remain low to moderate, 5 - 15 knots, through Thursday. Sea Surface temperatures are a marginal 26 - 27°C, and there is plenty of dry, stable air from the Saharan Air Layer (SAL) to to TD 2's north. The relatively cool SSTs and dry air mean that TD 2 will not be able to intensify quickly. However, does appear likely that TD 2 has enough going for it that it will be able to become Tropical Storm Ana later today or on Wednesday. Most of the computer models show some weak development, but none of them predict TD 2 will become a hurricane. It is unusual for storms forming this far north to make it all the way across the Atlantic to hit the Lesser Antilles Islands, and the current NHC forecast track aiming TD 2 north of the islands appears to be a good one.
Elsewhere in the Atlantic
Two other tropical waves, one passing through the Lesser Antilles Islands, and one about 600 miles east of the islands, are mentioned in NHC's Graphical Tropical Weather Outlook. Both of these waves have very limited heavy thunderstorm activity that is not increasing, and are not a threat to develop over the next two days. None of the computer models develop either of these waves.
A large, disorganized tropical wave is just leaving the coast of Africa, south of the Cape Verdes Islands. The GFS and ECMWF models continue to predict the possible development of this wave late this week.
Figure 2. Track and total rain amount from Typhoon Morakot. Image credit: NASA/GSFC.
Death toll from Typhoon Morakot in the hundreds
The death toll from Typhoon Morakot continues climb, as a landslide triggered by the storm's heavy rains hit the small town of Shiao Lin in southern Taiwan. Shiao Lin has a population of 1,300, and 400 - 600 people are missing in the wake of the landslide. Morakot killed an additional 41 elsewhere on Taiwan, with 60 missing. Earlier, the storm killed 22 in the Philippines, and went on to kill 6 in mainland China, which it hit as a tropical storm with 50 mph winds and heavy rain. Morakot's heavy rains caused an estimated $1.3 billion in damage to China.
Morakot moved very slowly as it passed over Taiwan, dumping near world-record amounts of rain. Alishan in the mountains of southern Taiwan recorded 91.98" of rain over a two-day period, one of the heaviest two-day rains in world history. The world 2-day rainfall record is 98.42", set at Reunion Island on March 15 - 17, 1952. Alishan received an astonishing 9.04 feet of rain over a 3-day period. The highest 1-day rainfall total ever recorded on Taiwan occurred Saturday at Weiliao Mountain in Pingtung County, which recorded 1.403 meters (4.6 feet or 55 inches) or rain. Nine the ten highest one-day rainfall amounts in Taiwanese history were reached on Saturday, according to the Central Weather Bureau.
Felicia continues to weaken, but is a flash flooding threat to Hawaii
Tropical Storm Felicia continues to steadily weaken, thanks to high wind shear of 30 knots. Recent satellite loops show that almost no heavy thunderstorm activity remains, and what little there is has been pushed to the northeast side of the center, exposing the surface center as a swirl of low clouds.
Figure 3. Tropical storm Felicia appeared as a swirl of low clouds with one spot of heavy thunderstorm activity to the northeast as it approached Hawaii yesterday evening.
High wind shear will continue to weaken Felicia today, and the storm is unlikely to cause major flooding problems as it moves over the islands today. The greatest danger of flooding will be over the northern islands, where Felicia's main moisture is concentrated.
Link to follow:
Wundermap for Hawaii
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I'll have an update Wednesday morning.
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I agree. It's not pretty around here. I miss the sound of thunderstorms, too. :(
lol. oh and this forecast is also available for free
hes friends with despereaux
Over here in NW FLS we've been like that for about the last four years. Finally hearing the boomers with frequency this year and not watering lawn hardly at all. Pretty puffy clouds all over too, nice.
Its based on dvorak, Dvorak is based on convection.. It's alot more complicated than that but thats the gist..
ADVANCED DVORAK TECHNIQUE
ADT-Version 7.2.3
Tropical Cyclone Intensity Algorithm
----- Current Analysis -----
Date : 11 AUG 2009 Time : 211500 UTC
Lat : 14:36:02 N Lon : 30:26:32 W
CI# /Pressure/ Vmax
2.8 /1002.0mb/ 41.0kt
Final T# Adj T# Raw T#
(3hr avg)
2.8 3.0 3.3
Latitude bias adjustment to MSLP : +0.0mb
Center Temp : -9.3C Cloud Region Temp : -24.1C
Scene Type : SHEAR (0.07^ TO DG)
Positioning Method : FORECAST INTERPOLATION
Ocean Basin : ATLANTIC
Dvorak CI > MSLP Conversion Used : ATLANTIC
Tno/CI Rules : Constraint Limits : 1.2T/6hr
Weakening Flag : OFF
Rapid Dissipation Flag : OFF
funny...
was waiting to see what your response to that would be Storm...very funny!!!!
I will now have nightmares..lol. I hate clowns.
Link
?
I provided a link to computer models.
Link address is provided...[http://moe.met.fsu.edu/tcgengifs/]
Look this goes to the NWS homepage...
http://www.weather.gov/
Hmm...Must be automatic now. Cool.
The death toll from Typhoon Morakot continues climb, as a landslide triggered by the storm's heavy rains hit the small town of Shiao Lin in southern Taiwan. Shiao Lin has a population of 1,300, and 400 - 600 people are missing in the wake of the landslide. Morakot killed an additional 41 elsewhere on Taiwan, with 60 missing. Earlier, the storm killed 22 in the Philippines, and went on to kill 6 in mainland China, which it hit as a tropical storm with 50 mph winds and heavy rain. Morakot's heavy rains caused an estimated $1.3 billion in damage to China.
ReliefWEB,Typhoon Morakot
Click okay only if you trust this link:
[http://www.weather.gov/]
I see that. I read his post...wasn't sure what he was hinting at. After reading his post again, I understand what he's saying now.
Well currently TD#2 has some intense storms starting to take shape to the W N and E quadrants depicted by Shortwave Sat imagery... in my eyes TD#2 is ANA already with winds between 40 to 45MPH... unfortunately we don't have a QS pass to validate it... but based on ADT is a minimal TS. Finally, it has been doing quite well at building convection around its center to take care of massive dry air intrusion.
It's good to see they're taking the threat seriously. Bravo
Taz's computer was infected with the virus Malware and it may be some time before he's back he stated.
Sometimes it's hard to decipher comments on here(tone). I understand what you're saying now.
Sorry if I came across questioning you.
If you all would go Linux, no one would have to click the little "OK"...so the PC terrorists have won.
only 2 storms located where TD 2 is now went on to hit the US in this time frame
Galveston hurricane of 1915 and Hurricane Fran in 1996
Think you'll learn soon enough.LOL
Fairly new too, so names still escape me at the moment.
p.s. Go Yellow Jackets
Excuse my ignorance but do the past starting points of a depression/storm really factor in as much as current season data as El Nino and such? What I mean is, is there actually an area where waves form (besides the obvious off of Africa) that actually have shown to hit the CONUS regardless of season data?
For some goofy reason, you could track the number of responses to any one comment, look at the top most quoted, and the original poster would likely be a troll. I know it sounds backward. I don't like it either.
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