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El Nino's Absence Is Causing An Active Hurricane Season (mercurynews.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the active-ingredient dept.

Dan Drollette writes: Contrary to some items making the rounds of the Twitterverse, El Nino's are "Kryptonite for hurricanes." The Mercury News reports: "Irma has ripped a path of misery through the Caribbean and is aiming at Florida, but the first seed for its monster size and force was planted on the other side of the world more than six months ago. It happened innocently enough, when a widely anticipated El Nino failed to materialize over the Pacific Ocean. In time, that cleared a path for a hurricane to form in the Atlantic that grew to the size of the state of New York with winds topping 185 miles per hour. El Nino occurs when the Pacific heats up and flusters the atmosphere, setting off a chain reaction that causes wind shear across the Atlantic. Shear is wind blowing in different directions or speeds at various altitudes, and it can be Kryptonite for hurricanes. As powerful as they are, tropical cyclones have delicate structures. Shear can tear them apart. A budding storm can't get started and an established storm can't get strong."

17 of 148 comments (clear)

  1. El Nino and climate changes by ls671 · · Score: 4, Informative

    So what is the relation between El Nino and climate changes already?

    http://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2...

    https://www.skepticalscience.c...

    https://e360.yale.edu/features...

    --
    Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    1. Re:El Nino and climate changes by religionofpeas · · Score: 2

      I don't think $10 billion is all that much compared to potential effects on our future. It's certainly not making anybody rich.

    2. Re:El Nino and climate changes by religionofpeas · · Score: 4, Informative

      > 40% of NASA's budget was going to global warming research

      Where did you get that number, by the way ?

      I can't really find it in their 2016 budget. https://www.nasa.gov/sites/def...

    3. Re:El Nino and climate changes by hey! · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This is a typical conspiracy theory in that it posits people acting in ways that are against their interests.

      If you wanted to make a bundle as a climate scientist, you'd find credible proof that anthropogenic climate change isn't happening. The people who have the most money under the status quo are the ones who profit from the status quo.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    4. Re:El Nino and climate changes by thrich81 · · Score: 2

      So you are saying that being a climate scientist pays better then being an executive of a fossil fuel extraction corporation or a petroleum engineer? Now, the skill set to being a climate scientist might not intersect with that of a successful (rapacious) corporate exec, but the analytical skills required of a climate scientist and petroleum engineer intersect nicely.

    5. Re:El Nino and climate changes by dywolf · · Score: 3, Insightful

      don't take any tax incentives

      you first, obvious oil industry shill,

      --
      The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
    6. Re:El Nino and climate changes by dywolf · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Except that nobody ever made money saying "everything is all right, nothing to see here".

      Right.
      The oil industry doesnt benefit at all from trying to bury climate research.
      Just like the tobacco industry before them and supressing the link between nicotine and cancer.

      Riiiiiight.

      --
      The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
    7. Re:El Nino and climate changes by Tablizer · · Score: 3, Informative

      Most experts I've heard from don't claim there will be more hurricanes, only that hurricanes may do more damage because first, rising sea levels makes for more coastal flooding; and second, warm oceans evaporate more water into the storms such that they rain down harder over land.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    8. Re:El Nino and climate changes by SlaveToTheGrind · · Score: 2

      You know, I think of "insightful" posts like this when I read the constant grumbling about how Slashdot has become a cesspool of disaffected righties.

      Maybe you should dust off your Venn diagram and 'splain to the rest of us how someone who isn't a fan of government subsidies for energy is by definition an "oil industry shill."

  2. What are they talking about? by alzoron · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It happened innocently enough, when a widely anticipated El Nino failed to materialize over the Pacific Ocean.

    El Nino and La Nina cycles are typically an average of 5 years(2-7ish years). The last El Nino was in 2015-2016. We are currently in a La Nina. I'm not sure what El Nino they were expecting but it isn't due for at least a little while longer.

    1. Re:What are they talking about? by religionofpeas · · Score: 4, Informative

      The cycles aren't regular, though. It's perfectly possible for an El Nino to come back at any time. We are currently in a neutral zone.

  3. Wow, slashdot has gone down hill by thsths · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This used to be a place for eccentric and intelligent people to talk about technology and science. But this sounds more like a pub discussion of ignorant backwater folks now.

    1. Re: Wow, slashdot has gone down hill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The alt-right infested Slashdot not long ago. You can imagine what that did to the average intelligence level here.

    2. Re: Wow, slashdot has gone down hill by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 2

      "(usually downvoted by people on the left,)
      You don't know who down voted what ... and you most certainly don't know if the down voter is left, right or what ever ...

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  4. Re:NO! NO! NO! IT'S GLOBAL WARMING!!!!! by hey! · · Score: 4, Informative

    People assume that we'll have more hurricanes because they assume every consequence of AGW will be predictably catastrophic. That may not be a bad rule of thumb, but IIRC IPCC models are actually mixed as to the frequency of hurricanes. That's because hurricanes are the product of chaos; minor changes in initial conditions can tip the result one way or the other. It could be that we have some years with more hurricanes and some with less.

    The one things the model runs are consistent about is that hurricanes under AGW will pack more precipitation, which is kind of an obvious result, but it's nice to have your intuition confirmed every so often. On the other hand, as we saw with Harvey, rain can be a significant component of a hurricane's destructive power.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  5. And whose fault is this? by marciot · · Score: 4, Funny

    It's fairly obvious that el niño has been deported to Mexico due to the takedown of the DACA.

  6. Re:Billionaires? by riverat1 · · Score: 2

    It's an interglacial.

    If climate science or people did not even exist I would still bet on warming.

    Temperatures hit a peak around 6,000 to 8,000 years ago during the Holocene Climatic Optimum. Since then there's been a slow cooling trend as we would expect from an examination of Milankovitch Cycles. This would eventually lead to a new glacial period. I think you would lose that bet.