Skip to main content

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT HURRICANES

Hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones are the same storm.  However:

  • In the Northern Hemisphere they spin (looking from above) in the counterclockwise direction.
  • In the Southern Hemisphere they spin in the clockwise direction.
  • Something called the Coriolis Force created by the rotation of Planet Earth triggers the storm.
  • They are called:
    • Hurricane if initially formed in the Atlantic or Eastern Pacific Oceans.
    • Typhoon if formed in the Western North Pacific.
    • Cyclone if in the South Pacific and Indian Oceans.
  • The ocean waters need to be at least 80 F (27 C) from surface to 150 feet deep for these cyclonic storms to form.  Thus, the ocean is too cold during winter months.

  • Hurricanes cannot exist about 300 miles above and below the equator.  Thus, no storm of this nature has ever crossed the Equator.
  • At 39 MPH it is called a tropical storm and given a name.
  • Reaching a sustained 74 MPH the classification is changed to hurricane, typhoon or cyclone.
  • They are classified according the the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.

  • The most powerful storm ever was Typhoon Nancy in 1961.
    • Highest one-minute sustained winds of 213 MPH.
    • Lowest central pressure of 882 millibars.
    • Was a Category 5 for 5.5 days.
    • Caused damage in 2021 dollars of $4.3 billion in Japan and killed 200.
Interestingly enough, the second most powerful also occurred in 1961 and also made landfall in Japan.  Typhoon Violet went up to 207 MPH at 886 millibars, but dissipated before reaching Japan.

Tying for #3 were Typhoon Ida (yes, Ida) in 1958 and Hurricane Patricia (2015), both at 200 MPH.  
  • Ida created extensive damage in Japan and had a minimum central pressure of 877 mb, even lower than Nancy.
  • Patricia is especially noteworthy because it is the only one of these four with reliable measurements.  The field has significantly improved over the past half a century.  Patricia's central pressure dropped from 980 mb to 880, also lower than Nancy's, in two days, becoming the strongest hurricane in the Western Hemisphere, making landfall in Mexico.
Typhoon Tip in 1979 is worthy of mention because, while "only" reaching a wind speed of 190 MPH, had the lowest central pressure ever at 870 mb and a diameter of 1379 miles.  Tip formed in the East Pacific,  but here is how he would have looked if placed over the eastern part of the USA.


Finally, this remains a debatable topic, but is there a clear link between global warming and an increase in Category 4 and 5 hurricanes?  To me it just makes sense that the ocean surface, too, is now warming, meaning that hurricanes should be stronger.  From Wikipedia.


I'm off to record my TEDx talk on the Blue Revolution this morning, and will later tell you how you can watch it.  Aloha.

- 

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A NEXT COVID SUBVARIANT?

By now most know that the Omicron BA.5 subvariant has become the dominant infectious agent, now accounting for more than 80% of all COVID-19 cases.  Very few are aware that a new one,   BA.4.6,  is sneaking in and steadily rising, now accounting for 13% of sequenced samples .  However, as BA.4.6 has emerged from BA.4, while there is uncertainty, the scientific sense is that the latest bivalent booster targeting BA.4 and BA.5 should also be effective for this next threat. One concern is that Evusheld--the only monoclonal antibody authorized for COVID prevention in immunocompromised individuals--is not effective against BA.4.6.  Here is a  reference  as to what this means.  A series of two injections is involved.  Evusheld was developed by British-Swedish company AstraZeneca, and is a t ixagevimab  co-packaged with  cilgavimab . More recently, Los Angeles County reported on  subvariant BA.2.75.2 . which Tony Fauci termed suspicious and troublesome.  This strain has also been spreading in
Post a Comment
Read more

Part 3: OUR NEXT AROUND THE WORLD ODYSSEY

Before I get into my third, and final, part of this cruise series, let me start with some more newsworthy topics.  Thursday was my pandemic day for years.  Thus, every so often I return to bring you up to date on the latest developments.  All these  subvariants  derived from that Omicron variant, and each quickly became dominant, with slightly different symptoms.  One of these will shock you. There has been a significant decline in the lost of taste and smell.  From two-thirds of early patients to now only 10-20% show these symptoms. JN.1, now the dominant subvariant, results in mostly mild symptoms. However, once JN.1 infects some, there seem to be longer-lasting symptoms. Clearly, the latest booster helps prevent contracting Covid. A competing subvariant,  BA.2.86,  also known as Pirola , a month ago made a run, but JN.1 prevailed. No variant in particular, but research has shown that some of you will begin to  lose hair  for several months.  This is caused by stress more than anythi
Post a Comment
Read more

HONOLULU TO SEATTLE

The story of the day is Hurricane Milton, now a Category 4 at 145 MPH, with a track that has moved further south and the eye projected to make landfall just south of Sarasota.  Good news for Tampa, which is 73 miles north.  Milton will crash into Florida as a Category 4, and is huge, so a lot of problems can still be expected in Tampa Bay with storm surge.  If the eye had crossed into the state just north of Tampa, the damage would have been catastrophic.  Milton is a fast-moving storm, currently at 17 MPH, so as bad as the rainfall will be over Florida, again, a blessing.  The eye will make landfall around 10PM EDT today, and will move into the Atlantic Ocean north of Palm Bay Thursday morning. My first trip to Seattle was in June of 1962 just after I graduated from Stanford University.  Caught a bus. Was called the  Century 21 Exposition .  Also the Seattle World's Fair.  10 million joined me on a six-month run.  My first. These are held every five years, and there have only been
Post a Comment
Read more