Re: Continental shelf and hurricane question
Posted by TuffyE on 8/28/2011, 12:38 pm
It has always been a very good question.  Off the SE coast, I think the answer has always been masked by the Gulf Stream and warmer temps there.  Our better storm historians MIGHT be able to verify that storms often intensify late before landfall...probably for this reason.  In the GOM, it seems to have been our experience that they weaken at the end (on the shelf?) but tend to intensify further out (loop current?).  There is also the synoptic effects of the land masses (ie.  Atlantic High and inland fronts) that tend to mask/overwhelm that effect, too.  I think we are stuck with the surge effect as mentioned by others.

The same question came to mind in watching Irene coming up across some of the banks in the Bahamas.  She seems to have missed them, though, and, again, the water temps and land interactions were more powerful, I suppose.  Still, it seems to me that there are specific areas where storms seem to rarely intensify and I would note that these tend to be deep areas such as just below P.R. and even south of Cuba.  Again, land interaction comes into play.

Maybe it is one of those "offseason" conversations, but there is a LOT of room for much discussion about intensification and all possible effects on it.  SST and "shear" aren't giving us much success, it seems.
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Continental shelf and hurricane question - Snowdog, 8/27/2011, 11:03 pm
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