Re: 2011 moving on up the list ....
Posted by
TuffyE on 8/19/2011, 5:12 pm
It should make us reconsider the meaning of an "active season", perhaps. The limitations of my technical knowledge have always made me struggle with the phrase "tropical characteristics", but that thought comes to mind in this context. A potential system is quite a different thing from a developing system. Our current tracking and classification system may not have been making this distinction well enough. It has been good enough for our limited period of observations, but we have always been aware of a tipping point in storm strength and size at which atmospheric and sea influences change. There have been hints here in recognizing that our storms size and speed make a BIG difference in the steering effects of weather patterns and air masses. Current models seem to be more suitable to one or the other and are not adjusting well to that same indistinct scale. That probably gets us to the heart of the current level of knowledge: We can't predict intensity with any degree of accuracy. Until we can, we will continue to have multiple models simply because one or another favor the size and development pattern of any current storm. In the math of modeling theory, that really seems quite backwards; the timing and strength of all outside steering factors would seem to be an order-of-magnitude larger than "local" conditions for a storm that would influence intensity changes. We obviously are really missing some factor. It could be SST CHANGES, dry air mass dispersion, predominant Easterly vs. Westerly RELATIVE speed, or any number of things that we might imagine....But we are really missing SOME factor that is keeping us light years away from intensity forecasting and, thus, dooming us to model bias and cherry-picking the guidance for our track forecasts in the time frames that we should have by now.
Pacific SSTs seemed like such a breakthrough, but, honestly, feels a little like voodoo at this point. We're going to have to find one storm in some location that is steadily intensifying at a reasonable rate and saturate it and that environment with probes. As wonderful as our hunters are, we are scratching the surface and looking at 3D functions in 2D snapshots. We can't learn from NON-developing systems as well because they are so susceptible to outside influences.
It would be interesting to know if NHC and similar orgs have brainstorming sessions in which research plans might be explored or if all are too busy trying to stay off the flyswatter. As you can see, I'm just drifting in my thoughts....weak steering currents. It does feel clear to me that intensity forecasting is the limiting factor in the field, though. What we need to know to do that better seems like an obviously vital area of information.
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LawKat,
8/12/2011, 6:03 pm Post A Reply
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