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Patricia, Strongest Hurricane Ever Seen In Eastern Pacific, Strikes In Mexico
CNN reports that Hurricane Patricia has made landfall in Mexico; Patricia is notable for having the third-lowest barometer reading ever recorded, and as "the strongest hurricane ever observed in the eastern Pacific or Atlantic oceans." Slate points out that at one point, "satellite estimates of Patricia’s intensity broke the Dvorak scale, peaking at 8.3 on the 8.0 scale. ... In fact, Patricia is now very close to the theoretical maximum strength for a tropical cyclone on planet Earth." The Weather Channel is tracking the storm's path, and predicts "catastrophic damage ... along a narrow path as the eye slices into the interior of southwest Mexico Friday night." Here's a map from the National Weather Service showing Patricia's track as well as projected path.
Does anyone understand the Dvorak scale well enough to comment on how this hurricane supposedly broke it and yet it can be accurately put on the scale as an 8.3?
And more importantly, what is it on the Qwerty scale, which is the one that most of us know?
That's not quite so exclusive as it sounds. There are a lot of storms with the same barometer reading
870mm - Typhoon Tip (1979)
875mm - Typhoon June (1975)
875mm - Typhoon Nora (1973)
877mm - Typhoon Ida (1958)
880mm - Typhoon Kit (1966)
880mm - Typhoon Rita (1978)
880mm - Typhoon Vanessa (1984)
880mm - Hurricane Patricia (2015)
The 1970s were a bad decade for storms in the West Pacific.
I'm not sure the ocean is to blame for the weakening. Patricia had a very compact inner core and a tiny eye. Strong hurricanes generally undergo eyewall replacement cycles, in which the inner eyewall contracts in and an outer eyewall takes over as the main eyewall. The NHC advisories emphasized the very compact inner core in the 11 AM EDT advisory. The 5 PM EDT advisory mentioned an outer wind maximum, which would be the outer eyewall. It sounds like Patricia was undergoing and eyewall replacement cycle as it made landfall in Mexico. Category 5 hurricanes rarely maintain their maximum intensity for very long. Eyewall replacement cycles typically result in the storm weakening while that takes place. Normally, cool waters associated with the California current (the cool northerly branch of the north Pacific gyre) do result in cool waters in the eastern Pacific, but I don't think that's the primary reason for Patricia weakening. I think an eyewall replacement cycle is primarily responsible for the weakening.
First, some background. Dvorak is a well-known blowhard tech pundit. His blowhardness is so great that meteorologists unanimously decided to adopt the scale to measure the strength of hurricanes.
To put this in perspective, imagine being in the same room with one Dvorak. Then imagine the same room filled with eight point three Dvoraks. That's how strong this hurricane is.