Quote:
Originally Posted by ThirdOfFive
It is always something, isn't it? Every year since Katrina (which was supposed to signal the beginning of a HURRICANE ARMAGEDDON for GAWDsakes of SUPER POWERFUL STORMS that the planet has never YET SEEN), there've been excuses, one or more per year, as to just why this wasn't happening.
That info probably exists on the 'net. Be fun to find and catalog it.
It is not the end of the season yet. Hurricanes can and probably will still happen. And when they do, we will definitely hear about them. But this 18-year trend of doleful-predictions-followed-by-hollow-excuses is holding strong.
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Just a few of the "reasons" I was able to find.
1: The stratosphere apparently has to be abnormally warm for heightened hurricane formation. “Strong cold anomalies are being detected in the stratosphere over Southern Hemisphere. The anomalous cooling results from the water vapor coming from the January Hunga Tonga eruption. Cooling on this scale has not been seen in modern satellite records, so this is a significant event.” (Andrej Fles, “Severe Weather Europe”, 29/08/2022)
2: Subsurface ocean temps are too cool to produce energetic la Nina, which is apparently essential for hurricane formation. “Right now, the subsurface temperatures are much cooler than during El Niño…The immediate near-surface temperatures are still warmer, but the subsurface water pool and the warm water pool have dissipated, and so once that pops to the surface, it becomes La Niña,” (Pitchstone waters dot com, April 9, 2024).
I wonder--how do they measure "subsurface" ocean temps, and how far down?
3: Wind Shear isn’t doing what it is supposed to be doing. “upper-level winds over the Atlantic tend to be stronger than usual, and thus stronger wind shear results. The faster air flow in the upper troposphere leads to faster wind speed with increasing height, making the upper atmosphere less favorable for tropical storm development.” (“Meet Wind Shear, the Phenomenon That Can Rip a Hurricane Apart” Zachary Handlos, Scientific American dot com, May 23, 2024)
4: Winds coming off the Sahara haven’t been as conducive to hurricane formation as usual. (Office of Response and Restoration, NOAA.GOV).
A sort of confusing read.
5: “Hurricane Nadine in 2012 had dry Saharan air circulating near it—another potential inhibitor of intensification. In general, dry air can sink to the surface creating pools of cold air. The cold air often weakens the storm because it steals energy that would otherwise be available to the storm to grow stronger.” (“Since Katrina: NASA Advances Storm Models, Science”, Phys dot org, 8/21/2015
6” “Global warming is making the atmosphere more hostile to the formation of tropical cyclones.” (Andrea Thompson, Scientific American, 6/27/22).
7: “An unusual African monsoon season is not producing the sort of atmospheric seeds that typically go on to become hurricanes. Air high above the tropical Atlantic is so warm that it is actually preventing storms from brewing”. (Why Hurricane Season is Suddenly Quiet”, Scott Dance, The Washington Post).
Note how this directly conflicts with Rationalization #1.
Anyway, there you have it. A hodgepodge of rationalizations, some apparently in direct contradiction to others. But all "scientific".