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Rare South Atlantic Hurricane Heads Toward Brazil
jellisky writes "An unprecendented sort of weather event has been occuring recently, without much fanfare at all. A tropical cyclone in the south Atlantic is slowly drifting toward Brazil. The southern Atlantic ocean isn't exactly a hurricane hotbed, as pointed out by National Hurricane Center forecaster Jack Beven, "We know there hasn't been a hurricane in that area since at least the satellite era, the mid-60s at the minimum." The storm is a small one, though, but has estimated winds near minimal hurricane strength (74-95 mph). It's quite an interesting sight, perfect for piquing the weather curiousity that many of us have."
Brazilian mamba ?
Here's a nicer image of the cyclone.
We had the tail end of a hurricane from baja hit southern California about 2 years ago... a very rare event.
It didn't do a whole lot of damage; many areas get 80-90mph Santa Ana winds occasionally.
Nothing to see here; Move along.
Interesting isn't a word I'd choose to use for storms which are people killers.
-- There is no spoon. Only fork.
I know god exists. I read it on the internet, so it must be true.
Over the last year there have been several unusual hurricane events. The first recorded hurricane in the Atlantic to occur in April was in 2003, along with the first recorded hurricane in December, both breaking long-standing records. This one however is most unusual because of the weather patterns in that part of the world. While they have most of the necessary conditions (warm water, weather systems) the prevailing winds blow from west to east (as opposed to east to west for the North Atlantic tropics), usually tearing systems that could develop into shreads.
This becomes a problem because unlike areas that are used to hurricanes (US, Carribbean, Pacific, Australia, Madagascar) the Brazilians have no experience with tropical systems, so they have no way of knowing what to expect. Having lived through 16 of them (including Betsy in 1965, Camille in 1969 and Andrew in 1992) all I can say is that anyone living in the potential landfall area might want to consider going inland a ways.
A good site to look at is the Naval Research Labs Monterey hurricane page located here:
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/tc_pages/tc_home.html
It lists all of the systems they are following, along with a very good collection of satellite images.
....global warming....and all who thrive in her... ;-)
-psy
Maybe it's one of the first signs that this prediction may be accurate.
And, as the article says, Bush thinks Global Warmin is a hoax. Typical.
-
Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
The OSEI image looks like it was hastily assembled.....
"I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
Aesthetically more pleasing. However, the OSEI image didn't crop the edges of the storm system, and the increased amount of land mass visible allows easier identification of where the storm is occuring in relation to the South American coast. In addition, the infrared information contained in the OSEI image makes it far more easy to distinguish between relatively warm, low-lying clouds (yellowish) and the cold tops of the cloud towers near the eye of the storm (in white).
"I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
Most of the South Atlantic is actually cooler than average, so it seems unlikely that global warming is to blame.
Now I'm not thinking to myself, "gee, that cyclone could be a good thing, sweeping out all those smog-yellow clouds like that...."
~UP
Eat the Path.
It's a cyclone. It's the Southern Hemisphere. There are only Hurricaynes in the Northern Hemisphere.
In any case, most models do not predict large warming of the equatorial band, partially because evaporation over tropical oceans keeps the atmosphere from heating. Of course, this increased evaporation leads to increased latent heat, which is a possible cause of extreme weather.
Having said that, one extreme event does not proof of climate change make. Climate change is about long term trends, not short term weather. If we see more South Atlantic hurricanes over the next decade, then there would be an indication that they could be a result of climate change.
Then we could look for the proximate cause: increased latent heat, ocean temperature patterns, change in winds, salinity changes, all of the above concurrent or consecutive, whatever. Then we would ask, is this change something we would expect from human induced change, eg increased greenhouse gas forcing or aerosols or something else.
Subject: G7) Why doesn't the South Atlantic Ocean experience tropical cyclones?
Though many people might speculate that the sea surface temperatures are too cold, the primary reasons that the South Atlantic Ocean gets no tropical cyclones are that the tropospheric (near surface to 200mb) vertical wind shear is much too strong and there is typically no inter-tropical convergence zone (ITCZ) over the ocean (Gray 1968). Without an ITCZ to provide synoptic vorticity and convergence (i.e. large scale spin and thunderstorm activity) as well as having strong wind shear, it becomes very difficult to nearly impossible to have genesis of tropical cyclones.
However, in rare occasions it may be possible to have tropical cyclones form in the South Atlantic. In McAdie and Rappaport (1991), the US National Hurricane Center documented the occurrence of a strong tropical depression/weak tropical storm that formed off the coast of Congo in mid-April 1991. The storm lasted about five days and drifted toward the west-southwest into the central South Atlantic. So far, there has not been a systematic study as to the conditions that accompanied this rare event.
Pasted from the local oglobo.globo.com, free reg. required.
Ciclone Catarina ganha forca e deve atingir Santa Catarina neste domingo
ClicRBS
CBN
RIO - Batizado de Catarina, o ciclone extratropical que se formou a 440 quilometros da costa sul do pais ganhou forca durante a madrugada deste sabado e deve chegar ao continente na madrugada deste domingo, se for mantido este ritmo de deslocamento.
O ciclone, que tem ventos de 118 a 152 quilometros por hora, deve entrar no continente brasileiro entre Itajai, no litoral norte catarinense, e a Foz do Prata, no litoral gaucho, atingindo principalmente as praias de mar aberto. Especialistas preveem ventos de 70 km/h, podendo chegar a 170 km/h em alto mar.
E possivel que o fenomeno afete areas no interior catarinense. Meteorologistas alertam, porem, que nao ha razao para panico. Os efeitos causados pelo ciclone extratropical seriam chuva, vento forte e ressaca no mar. De acordo com a previsao do Centro de Hidrografia da Marinha, as ondas deverao chegar a tres metros de altura no litoral norte de Santa Catarina ate Cabo Frio, no Rio de Janeiro. Em mar aberto, as ondas poderao atingir quatro metros de altura.
Em Santa Catarina, a Defesa Civil e Policia Rodoviaria Federal mantem equipes em plantao permanente atendendo pelo telefone 191. O ciclone que ocorre no litoral e um fenomeno inedito no Atlantico Sul.
Nas imagens de satelite, o ciclone extratropical, com caracteristicas tropicais, e muito parecido com um furacao - o tipo especifico de ciclone que se abate sobre o Oceano Atlantico Norte, o Mar do Caribe, o Golfo do Mexico e o Oceano Pacifico Leste, ao Norte do Equador.
- Esse ciclone e incomum porque se desprendeu do restante da frente fria. E a primeira vez que eu vejo um ciclone extratropical perto do Brasil tao concentrado assim - disse Francisco de Assis Diniz, chefe do Centro Nacional de Previsao do Instituto Nacional de Meteorologia, surpreso com a imagem.
Wow! Did babelfish improved that much since the last time I used it? Apart from calling Rio "River" :), it's a reasonable translation, for a machine:
Cyclone Catherine gains force and must reach Santa Catarina in this sunday ClicRBS CBN
RIVER - Baptized of Catherine, the extratropical cyclone that if formed the 440 kilometers of the south coast of the country gained force during the dawn of this Saturday and must arrive at the continent in the dawn of this sunday, will have remained this rhythm of displacement.
The cyclone, that has winds of 118 for the moment the 152 kilometers, must enter in the Brazilian continent between Itajai, the coast catarinense north, and the Estuary of the Silver, in the coastal gaucho, reaching mainly the beaches of open sea. Specialists foresee winds of to 70 km/h, being able to arrive the 170 km/h in high sea.
It is possible that the phenomenon affects areas in the catarinense interior. Meteorologistas alerts, however, that it does not have reason for panic. The effect caused for the extratropical cyclone would be rain, strong wind and undertow in the sea. In accordance with the forecast of the Center of Hydrography of the Navy, the waves will have to arrive the three meters of height in the coast north of Santa Catarina until Cold Handle, in Rio De Janeiro. In opened sea, the waves will be able to reach four meters of height.
In Santa Catarina, the Civil Defense and Federal Road Policy keep teams in permanent plantao taking care of for telephone 191. The cyclone that occurs in the coast is an unknown phenomenon in the South Atlantic.
In the satellite images, the extratropical cyclone, with tropical characteristics, very is seemed an hurricane - the specific type of cyclone that if abates on the Atlantic Ocean North, the Sea of the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean East, to the North of the Equator.
- This cyclone is uncommon because it was gotten loose of the remain of the cold front. It is the first time that I see a extratropical cyclone close to Brazil so concentrated thus - said Francisco de Assis Diniz, head of the National Center of Forecast of the National Institute of Meteorology, surpreso with the image.
1. I first found out about the storm on Weather Underground.
;)
2. Dvorak Source
3. CNN's 1st page on it. 4. CNN's follow-up page on it.
*. Hats off to the person that beat me to a first post.
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The Brazilians dispute "Catarina" isn't a hurricane. But they've never had one before. (shrugs)
Life is irony, and nothing ever goes as planned.
Cyclones are in the pacific and Indian oceans. However perhaps "anti-hurricane" would be a better name since it has the opposite spin to a normal Hurricane.
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