2005 Hurricane Season

[GordMay]

Colorado State University hurricane forecaster William Gray has released his December ‘04 prediction for the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, including the prediction of 11 Named Storms, with 6 Hurricanes, of which 3 are expected to become Major Hurricanes. Additionally, Dr. Gray has forecasted a 49% probability of Landfall on the US East Coast, as well as an above average probability of a Major Hurricane making Landfall in the Caribbean.

More From: http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu/forecasts/

Extended Range Forecast of Atlantic Seasonal Hurricane Activity and U.S. Landfall Strike Probability for 2005
by
William M. Gray and Philip J. Klotzbach (Issued: 3 December 2004)
Specifically: http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu.../2004/dec2004/

“... We foresee a slightly above-average hurricane season for the Atlantic basin in 2005. Also, an above-average probability of U.S. major hurricane landfall is anticipated. We do not, however, expect anything close to the U.S. landfalling hurricane activity of 2004 ...”

PROBABILITIES FOR AT LEAST ONE MAJOR (CATEGORY 3-4-5) HURRICANE LANDFALL ON EACH OF THE FOLLOWING COASTAL AREAS:
1) Entire U.S. coastline - 69% (average for last century is 52%)
2) U.S. East Coast Including Peninsula Florida - 49% (average for last century is 31%)
3) Gulf Coast from the Florida Panhandle westward to Brownsville - 39% (average for last century is 30%)
4) Above-average major hurricane landfall risk in the Caribbean

See also “Interactive Landfall Probability Display” and more:
http://www.e-transit.org/hurricane/

“Eye on the Tropics” http://www.srh.noaa.gov/eyw/HTML/tropical.html

2005 Atlantic Hurricane Names
Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Dennis, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harvey, Irene, Jose, Katrina, Lee, Maria, Nate, Ophelia, Philippe, Rita, Stan, Tammy, Vince, & Wilma.

[Alan Wheeler]

I wonder if this is guess work, or the aid of a super computer? Either way, I think with the current Global Climate, the odds are stacked well in favour of the one predicting storms
However, on the seriuose side, I wonder if Hurricane prediction could one day be used against us by insurance companies. This is just an "out there" thought, but if you are insured against an accident and a storm is considered that at the mo, and the Season ahead could be predicted with reasonable accuracey, could or would and insurance company one day wash its hands of a cover.
Any thoughts???

[Pblais]

I doubt that the insurance companies will go in that direction. They work with longer term predictions. They don't generally get into predictions for specific locations for a given year. It's too much black magic and they don't really have to trust that year to year analysis.

Should they feel they took too big a hit in any one year they just raise rates overall. It covers the bases better. You can't beat the insurance company odds. They always win even if they lose one year. They don't have to get it exactly right.

The trend seems to me to be more exclusions in more ways along with rate increases. It's not just insurance for boats either. For boats it seems the bigger issue are the carriers just getting out of the business totally.

[GordMay]

Another busy hurricane season forecast

With Florida still reeling from last year’s destructive hurricanes, a noted hurricane expert today said he expects another “active” storm season this year and a 73-percent chance of a major hurricane making landfall in the United States.

Prof. William Gray, a researcher at Colorado State University, predicts 13 named storms, including seven hurricanes, will sweep across the Atlantic this year. He also says there is an above-average risk that a major hurricane — Category 3 or higher — will make landfall in the Caribbean.

Gray, who along with his team has been issuing forecasts for 22 years, boosted by two the number of storms predicted for this year from an earlier forecast in December.

Dr. Gray's Tropical Storm Forecast: April, 2005
http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu/Forecasts/

The main culprits for the increased storm activity, according to Gray, is an increased warming of Atlantic waters and a belief that El Niño, a weather phenomenon that keeps hurricanes at bay, is not likely to occur this year.

On average there are 9.6 storms including 5.9 hurricanes during the season from June 1 to Nov. 30. Last year there were 14 named storms, including nine hurricanes. Four of those hurricanes — Charles, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne —made landfall in Florida, causing an estimated 100 deaths and $20 billion in damage.

[delmarrey]

Most people are probably quite unaware that they may actually have legal obligations for what happens to their boats, or rather what their boats do to other property, during a hurricane. Such obligations have been demonstrated in numerous court cases.

There is a well-established legal doctrine that almost everything that happens during a storm is classified as an “Act of God.” That means that if your roof blows off onto someone else’s house, you are not responsible for that damage. However, negligent behavior is excluded from that doctrine if resulting damage was preventable by taking reasonable precautions.

The most famous case was that of a barge owner who anchored his large barge in a bayou and took no extra measures when a storm came up. The barge broke loose and wrecked a large factory and the barge owner was held liable.

There are numerous examples of yacht owners who failed to take any, or reasonable precautions to secure their vessels, wherein a court ruled that they were liable for damages caused by their vessels despite the storm. Thus, a boat owner who decides to abandon his boat to his insurance company just to get rid of it, he risks not only a possible denial of his insurance claim, but a law suit for any damages his vessel may cause.

In one case that I was involved in, a homeowner who just happened to be a retired lawyer rented out his dock to an out-of-state boat owner. Big mistake there, right? Well our lawyer friend called the boat owner to advise him of the storms approach, not once but three times, getting an answering machine each time. But he did something else, too: he recorded his phone calls.

As expected, the boat owner did nothing to secure the boat, and as the homeowner was in a wheel chair, was not able to do it, though he had asked a neighbor for help, wasn’t able to get any. Thus the homeowner made a prudent, if failed effort. Well, that boat wrecked the swimming pool and patio before ending up in the living room. Then the real fun began. The boat owner filed a claim for the storm damages to both the boat and the liability claim by the homeowner. But for the homeowner’s allegation that the boat owner failed to secure his boat, the insurer probably would never have known. But now they’ve got a liability claim on their hands from a homeowner angry about the boat owner abandoning his boat.

The insurance company denied the hull claim based on breach of contract because the insured failed to protect his property, leaving him without liability coverage also. The boat owner sued the insurer and the homeowner sued the boat owner who lost both contests. The damage assessed to the boat owner’s negligence was $78,000.
Similarly, if a boat breaks loose and plows into a dozen other boats for want of taking action in the face of a storm, that boat owner may be also held liable.

A boat owner is legally required to take “reasonable and prudent” actions to prevent his property from damaging others. Reasonable and prudent means such actions as any experienced boater would take, not a half-hearted effort for appearances sake. There are thousands of people who buy boats, park them somewhere far from home, and then forget about them, figuring that because it is insured, they can just forget about it and collect the insurance when it gets wrecked. That kind of thinking can cost one dearly.

Related Reading:

* Safe Harbor
* What to do if Your Boat Is Hurricane Damaged
* Storm Damaged Boats



http://www.yachtsurvey.com/storm_legal_obligation.htm

[Alan Wheeler]

Most interesting Delmarrey.
Pblias, I was meanign way in the future. Totally hypothetical. what if someone could accurately predict that a Hurricane of X magnitude was going to make landfall at point Y on W date I a long term very accurate prediction was able to be made, could an insurance company get out of a claim? Just hypothetical.
Interestingly though, I was reading an article just recently and it seems there is already a system in place for insurance companies, where a "line" is drawn across risk area's, denoting probabilty of storms accuring. Thus premiums have different rates depending on where your boat is.

Oh and a little side note. I think we will continue to see major storms increase in frequency and find them occuring in area's not normally seen before. A Hurricane is Natures way of dissapating heat. As Oceans warm, the Hurricane dissapates that heat. The warmer we get, the more storms we will see.

[delmarrey]

Is that the earth goes through cycles. About 5 years ago I was up at Jasper (glacier) Park in Alberta, Canada. There is one glacier there called the Angle Glacier that hangs over a cliff where the scientists have dated the rows of broken rock that has been pushed out by the glaciers advances. From high up they look like waves. Anyway, the dates are from 350 to 600 years between each row. And right now the glacier has receded as far back as they can possibly tell it ever has.

So, if all things are on the cycle’s schedule, we're in for another cold spell soon. But soon could mean 100 years. Things change. We could get heavy snow for 5 years then go back to normal.

Another thing is that volcano activity. Which has also contributed to the colder years. Like Krakatau, over by Sumatra, where more than half an Island 5 Km by 10 Km blew up and sunk into the ocean. The ash went around the whole world.
The volcanic dust veil that created such spectacular atmospheric effects also acted as a solar radiation filter, lowering global temperatures as much as 1.2 degree C in the year after the eruption. Temperatures did not return to normal until 1888.

Ref: http://volcano.und.nodak.edu/vwdocs/...estion879.html

[GordMay]

Delmarrey suggests that "... So, if all things are on the cycle’s schedule, we're in for another cold spell soon ..."

I think those 350-600 year cycles all occurred prior to the industrial revolution, and the ensuing environmental displacement. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see a “new” cycle emerge.

[GordMay]

NOAA: 2005 Atlantic Hurricane Outlook (Issued: 16 May, 2005)

”NOAA’s 2005 Atlantic hurricane season outlook indicates a 70% chance of an above-normal hurricane season, a 20% chance of a near-normal season, and only a 10% chance of a below-normal season. This outlook is produced by scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Climate Prediction Center (CPC), Hurricane Research Division (HRD), and National Hurricane Center (NHC). See NOAA’s definitions of above-, near-, and below-normal seasons.

The outlook calls for 12-15 tropical storms, with 7-9 becoming hurricanes, and 3-5 of these becoming major hurricanes ...”

Goto: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/product...hurricane.html

and:
Realtime monitoring of tropical Atlantic conditions:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/hurricane/

Realtime monitoring of tropical East Pacific conditions:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/Epac_hurr/

[GordMay]

TROPICAL DEPRESSION ONE - ADVISORY NUMBER 3
NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL - 5 AM EDT THU JUN 09 ‘05

DEPRESSION SLOWLY BECOMING BETTER ORGANIZED AND MOVING A LITTLE
FASTER...

A TROPICAL STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT FOR THE PROVINCES OF
PINAR DEL RIO AND THE ISLE OF YOUTH IN WESTERN CUBA. TROPICAL
STORM WATCHES OR WARNING MAY BE REQUIRED FOR OTHER PARTS OF WESTERN
CUBA LATER TODAY.

INTERESTS ELSEWHERE IN THE NORTHWESTERN CARIBBEAN AND THE
SOUTHEASTERN GULF OF MEXICO SHOULD CLOSELY MONITOR THE PROGRESS OF
THIS SYSTEM.

T 5 AM EDT...0900Z...THE CENTER OF TROPICAL DEPRESSION ONE WAS
LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 18.6 NORTH...LONGITUDE 83.9 WEST OR ABOUT
185 MILES... 295 KM...WEST-SOUTHWEST OF GRAND CAYMAN ISLAND.
THIS IS ALSO ABOUT 225 MILES... 360 KM...SOUTH-SOUTHEAST OF
THE WESTERN TIP OF CUBA.

THE DEPRESSION IS NOW MOVING TOWARD THE NORTH NEAR 8 MPH
...13 KM/HR...AND THIS GENERAL MOTION IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE WITH
AN ADDITIONAL INCREASE IN FORWARD SPEED DURING THE NEXT 24 HOURS.

MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS ARE NEAR 35 MPH... 55 KM/HR...WITH HIGHER
GUSTS...MAINLY IN RAIN BANDS WELL TO THE NORTH AND EAST OF THE
CENTER. SOME STRENGTHENING IS FORECAST DURING THE NEXT 24
HOURS...AND THE DEPRESSION COULD BECOME A TROPICAL STORM LATER
TODAY.

More info’ at:
Tropical Depression ONE - http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

[GordMay]

Hurricane/Typhoon/Cyclone Tracking:

What determines the movement of tropical cyclones?

Tropical cyclones can be thought of as being steered by the surrounding environmental flow throughout the depth of the troposphere (from the surface to about 12 km or 8 mi). Dr. Neil Frank, former director of the U.S. National Hurricane Center, used the analogy that ”... the movement of hurricanes is like a leaf being steered by the currents in the stream, except that for a hurricane the stream has no set boundaries ...“

In the tropical latitudes (typically equatorward of 20̊-25̊N or S), tropical cyclones usually move toward the west with a slight poleward component. This is because there exists an axis of high pressure called the subtropical ridge that extends east-west poleward of the storm. On the equatorward side of the subtropical ridge, general easterly winds prevail. However, if the subtropical ridge is weak - often times due to a trough in the jet stream - the tropical cyclone may turn poleward and then recurve back toward the east. On the poleward side of the subtropical ridge, westerly winds prevail thus steering the tropical cyclone back to the east. These westerly winds are the same ones that typically bring extratropical cyclones with their cold and warm fronts from west to east.

Many times it is difficult to tell whether a trough will allow the tropical cyclone to recurve back out to sea (for those folks on the eastern edges of continents), or whether the tropical cyclone will continue straight ahead and make landfall.

Steering currents are defined as the vertically averaged (and pressure weighted) wind that pushes a tropical cyclone (tropical depression, tropical storm or hurricane) along. It is very difficult if not impossible to determine the exact contributions a specific layer of winds has for that motion, but we can estimate "steering", IF we know what the winds surrounding a tropical cyclone are.

We routinely know surrounding winds in the low levels (about 1,500 to 2,000 feet) and near the surface, and in the upper levels about 30,000-45,000 feet. Buoys, ships, satellites, and aircraft provide these observations.

There are occasions when low-level and upper-level winds are very different in direction and speed (a "shearing/sheared" environment). Weak tropical cyclones are routinely steered by lower-level winds, while strong hurricanes (which are typically deep) are more often steered by deep layer averaged winds. Upper level wind steering (from about 25,000-50,000 feet) becomes very important in strong hurricanes.

In "steering" situations, where wind changes speed and direction with height (sheared environment), it becomes impossible to forecast "steering" change without forecasting tropical cyclone depth/strength/intensity change! Therefore, there are many situations where a tropical cyclone will move in one direction if it is weak and remains weak.
However, it could move in a different direction (with possibly a different speed) if it were stronger and deeper.

Therefore any statement about track MUST be tied to intensity, and intensity change in sheared environments (one cannot forecast track without forecasting intensity).

Further Reading:
“Tropical Cyclone Research” ~ At http://www.po.gso.uri.edu/Numerical/...c/tropcyc.html

“ Hurricane Tracking Technologies” ~ by Dr. Ed Rodgers and Dr. Fritz Hasler
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/ltc/eos/c2.html

“Extropolation” http://www.tpub.com/content/aerograp.../14010_215.htm

“Tropical cyclones of the North Atlantic Ocean”
http://www.meteo.an/meteo2/eng/reports/hurtrop2.htm

"Hurricanes: Their Nature and Impacts on Society" ~ by R.A. Pielke Jr and R.A. Pielke Sr.

"Global Perspectives on Tropical Cyclones" ~ by R. L. Elsberry (Editor) et al

“Global Guide to Tropical Cyclone Forecasting” ~ by G.J. Holland (Editor) Et al