HURRICANE EARL - FIRST STOP NORTH CAROLINA OUTER BANKS
Written by: Brian Neudorff
Earl continues to be a very large, very strong, and very dangerous category 4 hurricane. Overnight and earlier this morning Earl appears to have peak in intensity with maximum sustained winds of 145 mph (10 mph shy of category 5 strength)
Its overall structure has looked impressive on satellite all morning long with a well defined eye. It appears that Earl has made another turn to the north-northwest as it continues to move around the western edge of the subtropical high.
There are numerous hurricane and topical storm watches and warnings posted from the North Carolina/South Carolina boarder north all the way up to Maine and the Canadian Maritime.
Earl will probably weaken some as it gets closer to the North Carolina coast later tonight, but I wouldn't be surprised if it maintains its strength as a category 4 storm. My thinking continues to be the same as it was several days ago that Earl will not pass directly over the Outer Banks of North Carolina but be 50 to 100 miles to the east. The forecast has it arriving late tonight into very early Friday morning.
It will turn more north-northeast during the day Friday. From Norfolk, VA all the way to Southern New England I think rain along with tropical storm conditions will persist during the day on Friday as the worst of the storm remains out over the ocean. By Friday night early Saturday morning it will pass very close to Cape Cod, MA. By then Earl should weaken to a weak category 2 or strong category 1.
The models seem to be in fair agreement keeping the center of Earl out over the ocean and off U.S. soil. Although I don't think it will make landfall in North Carolina it is still possible that it could pass over Cape Cod. If it were to make landfall in New England it would be the first hurricane to do so in almost two decades. The last one was hurricane Bob in August of 1991. A little side note, I got to experience Bob while visiting family in Connecticut.
Earl is a big storm and although the worst is not expected to affect land there will still be a lot of wind from sustained winds of 30-50 mph for most of the Mid-Atlantic coast, beach erosion and possible guys over 60 to maybe 70 mph which could knock out power. This storm may not be as bad as it could be but it will definitely have an impact along the east coast over the next 48 hours.
Hurricane Earl Resources – [NHC Earl Tracker] [NOAA Earl Satellite Images] [NHC Earl Public Advisory] [NHC Earl Forecast Discussion] [Earl Forecast Model Plots] [NOAA Buoy Observations] [NOAA tidal gauges] [StormPulse.com] [Wunderground.com Earl Resources] [Skeetobite Weather Earl Forecast Intensity and Path] [AccuWeather.com Hurricane Center] [AccuWeather.com Hurricane Center]
I hope you mets are just waiting to generate a really good answer to the question about how cold air is produced in the Arctic, because that was a really good question that I myself never thought about but don't know the answer to either. Try not to blow folks' questions off and maybe more people will participate in this blog. Sometimes it seems like only one or two answers is ever addressed at a time. And sometimes questions are entirely blown off all together. that defeats the purpose of a blog for folks to engage in. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteNo no no - no blow off here. You are right that is a very good question. In your question you were on the right track when you asked, "does it literally build, or stack up, then chunks of it break off and drop south?"
ReplyDeleteThe cold air at the poles and in the arctic build because an area of high pressure can be found just sitting over Alaska, Siberia or Northern Canada. Although the Arctic circle gets some sunshine during the summer the angle is not strong enough to really warm things up. As we go from summer to winter the solar radiation gets less and less. There are longer times of darkness than day light during the fall and winter. Then combine that with snow and ice cover that reflects most of the solar radiation back into space along with solar radiation being emitted back into space temps just get colder and colder with all that loss of energy. Temperatures can reach -30 degrees F to -60 degrees F.
No what can also allow it to get colder is if the jet stream that helps move all this colder air into the lower latitudes does drop south and stay north cutting off the flow then it can continue to keep getting colder as the cold air will build.
This simple answer to your question is that cold air doesn't form from no where but builds in the poles due to massive amounts of lost energy. Lack of energy from the sun and losing energy out into space because of a lack of clouds will quickly reduce temperatures. The primary source for all our heat on this planet is the sun. As we go into winter the arctic loses all that sun energy and to be honest their sun angle during the summer is more like a mid morning sun here in Rochester. If the sun only got that high here we wouldn't warm up much either.
I am sorry for the delay in my answer. To be honest was more trying to keep this blog and previous posts on topic with the Tropics and Hurricane Earl. My plan was to address this when we had a more open blog topic. I hope this answers your question and our apologize for the delay.
-Brian
Thanks, Brian. I never made the connection between colder air and lowered energy...but that makes perfect sense. I appreciate the thorough answer.
ReplyDeleteAnd please don't take the post about "blowing off" personally. To be honest, Brian, you are the most engaging and interactive on this blog than the other two channel 8 mets, so it really wasn't intended for you. You're a great meteorologist!