“Tiny Tims” — Stating The Obvious

‘Tiny Tims’ are a nickname for Hurricanes-Tropical storms which are well you know, tiny, and would probably have escaped detection before satellites were watching.

One thing for sure, it’s not global warming, man caused or otherwise, causing the higher numbers for named storms … But it might be global cooling lowering the real numbers. The last hurricane, ‘Bill’ was run off from the USA coastline by a cold front, that eventually stretched from New England to Tampa Florida. And it’s still August!!!

Keeping the hurricane record pure, is not an easy task. The very latest observation satellites of the last years are of such capability that they swamp out the old ’ship observations’, way back when

For instance, when the 1900 Galveston hurricane hit Galveston Texas, as many as 12,000 people were killed, the warning that there was even a hurricane coming ashore, was measured in hours — The hurricane warning system was very poor back then. This causes a problem with record keeping, when trying to equate storms over a hundred years, storm trends and predictions can be way off. Comparing modern hurricane-tropical storm detection and the old way, is difficult, if not near impossible, making chart comparisons very iffy(same can be said about tornadoes).

Now a NOAA led team is stating the obvious:

A NOAA-led team of scientists has found that the apparent increase in the number of tropical storms and hurricanes since the late 19th and early 20th centuries is likely attributable to improvements in observational tools and analysis techniques that better detect short-lived storms.

Tiny Tim — Short-lived Tropical Storm Chantal forms 210 miles south of Halifax, Nova Scotia on July 31, 2007.

High resolution (Credit: NOAA)

The new study, reported in the online edition of the American Meteorological Society’s peer-reviewed Journal of Climate, shows that short-lived tropical storms and hurricanes, defined as lasting two days or less, have increased from less than one per year to about five per year from 1878 to 2008.

“The recent jump in the number of short-lived systems is likely a consequence of improvements in observational tools and analysis techniques,” said Chris Landsea, science and operations officer at NOAA’s National Hurricane Center in Miami, and lead author on the study. “The team is not aware of any natural variability or greenhouse warming-induced climate change that would affect the short-lived tropical storms exclusively.”

More here:

Far Miss, Hurricane Bill

Model runs as of Wednesday August 19, 2009, 3:00 PM EST.

Hurricanes 2009, Through July

Ryan Maue of Florida State University writes in comments:

Global (Northern Hemisphere) tropical cyclone ACE for the months May – June – July is the lowest in at least the past 30-years or more.

I, for one, am not surprised.  Continued inactivity should persist for the next few weeks until the atmosphere catches up with the radiative warming of the tropical oceans due to the season called summer.

2007 was a dud.   2008 was saved from being a record year by 2007.  2009 is behind the pace of both years.  Amazing how natural variability affects tropical cyclone formation, tracks, and intensity.  Who would have thought?

Ryan’s Tropical web page at Florida State University has this graph that shows accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) :

I like it this way.

2009 Hurricane Forecast

After totally blowing the forecasts since 2005, this time the forecasters  step out with a word of caution. Basically, NOAA is saying we don’t have a clue. They can’t really stick it to the global warming hoaxers at this critical time, the charge is on for more taxes, so they punt. Hurricane prediction is nothing more than a statistical guessing game, with a touch of experience. No one can predict the future, we just aren’t that advanced.

So Far, So Good

The 2006 hurricane season has been good. No storms. Hope it lasts.

Wilma, Wilma, Wilma

Hurricane Wilma is unpredictable, to say the least. Where it’s going and what it going to do has at best been a guess.

Varying Wilma Models Confound Forecasters

Mayfield said one of the models used for Wilma has been a “windshield wiper,” widely varying each time it was been used. In some computer runs, it showed Wilma off the coast of Maine after five days. In others, the same model showed the storm off the coast of Cuba.

When the models agree, it is simple for forecasters to determine the path and speed of a hurricane. When the models disagree, forecasters often use a consensus to determine what they believe is the correct path and speed of a hurricane, Mayfield said.

When in doubt — punt. That’s what is currently going on. The public is being whipped into a froth down here in SWFL, the results of the hype, exaggeration and errors in reporting during Katrina. It’s now having a deleterious effect, and people are clearly panicking — not good.

It was not a good thing that in the MSM’s haste to ‘blame Bush’ that the latest event used in that hapless endeavor happened to be a hurricane. When real danger threatens, we need cool, objective evaluation, followed by calculated actions. We need a media that reports cold hard facts, so people can act accordingly. What we got from the MSM was hype, an illusion, a lie — Unfortunately, this has stuck in the public minds eye, and it is causing unnecessary reaction and actions to Wilma. We saw this over reaction first with Rita, where millions were unnecessarily evacuated, and now we are seeing a similar knee jerk reaction in SWFL. People are now being told to evacuate days before any shelters are available. The roads are clogged with people going who knows where. Hotels are booked, and canceled nearly as fast as they get booked.

How do people know they are not evacuating right into the path of the oncoming storm track? Pandemonium when we need sanity.