Hurricane overreactions.

[bullgator]

This is weather. Let me know when anyone can predict it with 100% certainty.

 

[Ruger#3]

Pretty sure that's the identical logic used to shut down the country during the pandemic and mandate the vaccine.

Let's stay with the topic and out of political opinion.

 

[tr21]

Jim Cantore will call it later today It was a cat 5 in Savannah yesterday according to the staff

I'm betting he says it was so bad it was off the cat scale ! you have to make it REAL bad to keep people scared of climate change !!!!

 

[RedHills]

"Operational practices at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) have varied over time; in recent years surface winds have typically been taken to be 80%–90% of the flight-level wind. This practice was motivated largely by the assumption that strong convective motions in the hurricane eyewall would be particularly effective at transporting high-momentum air to the surface layer. Use of these relatively high ratios has periodically resulted in criticism of NHC intensity estimates."

Regardless...TriCounty Elec Co op reporting 99% outage in their service area, which the track has dissected. I'll weigh in a week from now on over reaction...

 

[bassboy1]

This is weather. Let me know when anyone can predict it with 100% certainty.

Nobody is fussing about predictions. We're fussing about the the mainstream news reporting sustained winds of 115 mph, at the very same moment the buoys and weather stations are recording 61. Discrepancies in empirical recorded data, not predictions.

Here's the weather station that's pretty much where the east side of the eyewall landed. Highest recorded sustained wind was 53 knots (61 mph), and highest gusts were 67 knots (77 mph). The offshore buoys read similar figures.

NDBC - Station KTNF1 Recent Data

National Data Buoy Center - Recent observations from C-MAN station KTNF1 (29.819N 83.593W) - Keaton Beach, FL.

www.ndbc.noaa.gov

Why is the news reporting Cat 4 wind speeds when the buoy is reporting tropical storm wind speeds?

 

[JustUs4All]

Could it be because the guestimate is more scary than the actual readings?

 

[GeorgiaBob]

"Operational practices at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) have varied over time; in recent years surface winds have typically been taken to be 80%–90% of the flight-level wind. This practice was motivated largely by the assumption that strong convective motions in the hurricane eyewall would be particularly effective at transporting high-momentum air to the surface layer. Use of these relatively high ratios has periodically resulted in criticism of NHC intensity estimates."

Regardless...TriCounty Elec Co op reporting 99% outage in their service area, which the track has dissected. I'll weigh in a week from now on over reaction...
View attachment 1251259

Power outages are often more indicative of infrastructure and how well it is maintained than wind speed. A big chunk of eastern Liberty County was off line for several days, just a few years ago, after a thunderstorm with max wind gusts of under 50 miles an hour. The same area was powerless for over a week when Hurricane Matthew went by offshore, because trees took out a massive number of transformers, lines and poles. Yet the recorded max winds never topped 50 mph.

In St Marys (except for downtown where the usual flooding interrupted power) the power never went out during Matthew, even though they saw sustained winds of near 65 mph.

 

[Baroque Brass]

Wind and rain in grady county, been on generator for about two hours now.

 

[basstrkr]

View attachment 1251251

That's good!

 

[basstrkr]

My brother says its gon get where if you spill a glass of water you'll get a weather alert.

 

[bassboy1]

Could it be because the guestimate is more scary than the actual readings?

I guess you didn't read the post before yours. We're discussing reported measured readings vs actual measured readings.

Nothing to do with guestimates, predictions, prognostications, etc.

 

[WOODIE13]

From a first responder perspective, I’m glad things shut down. Less people being stupid trying to get to town and driving through high water and such. Lots of folks make bad decisions on good days, seem to make worse decisions during bad weather.

Truth

 

[RedHills]

Power outages are often more indicative of infrastructure and how well it is maintained than wind speed. A big chunk of eastern Liberty County was off line for several days, just a few years ago, after a thunderstorm with max wind gusts of under 50 miles an hour. The same area was powerless for over a week when Hurricane Matthew went by offshore, because trees took out a massive number of transformers, lines and poles. Yet the recorded max winds never topped 50 mph.

In St Marys (except for downtown where the usual flooding interrupted power) the power never went out during Matthew, even though they saw sustained winds of near 65 mph.

You totally missed the point...good, as there was direction to not go there. That white paper was penned 20 yrs ago. NHC "motivation" has changed in 20 yrs.

 

[JustUs4All]

I guess you didn't read the post before yours. We're discussing reported measured readings vs actual measured readings.

Nothing to do with guestimates, predictions, prognostications, etc.

Of course I read the post before mine. We were indeed discussing reported measured readings vs actual measured readings. On this point we agree.

We disagree on whether the discussed phenomenon had anything to do with guestimates, however. I would submit that if the reported measured readings don't match pretty closely with the actual measured readings there must have been some guestimating involved at some point in arriving at one or the other of the numbers. YMMV - LOL

 

[WOODIE13]

Forecast...time to fine them for being wrong

 

[Ruger#3]

16 deaths being reported thus forth, reported to be storm surge related.

 

[kmckinnie]

16 deaths being reported thus forth, reported to be storm surge related.

Hate to hear that.

 

[hopper]

Thats sounds like a serious case of first world problems!

Well when you come acustom to a certain lifestyle

 

[bullgator]

The ‘93 No Name storm was barely reported in advance and caused chaos and damage from the Gulf coast to New England. The weather folks got beat up for understating it in advance. Guess which way they’re going to error on now. Besides, people are stupid and won’t evacuate until a Cat 6 is heading their way. No matter what they report, some folks won’t be happy.

 

[Iwannashoot]

The "overreaction" might be a response to the official exaggeration.

For instance: At about 7:00 am this morning Idalia crossed the coast almost on top of an automated NOAA weather data recording station. The NOAA/National Hurricane Center (NHC) proclaimed that Idalia was a Category 3 "Major hurricane" (sustained winds of 96-112 knots) at the time. Their OWN weather station, right there where the storm came ashore, recorded MAXIMUM sustained winds for that period of 53 knots (tropical storm strength, below the minimum of 64 knots to be classified as a hurricane). The NOAA station is KTNF1, Keaton Beach, FL.

About an hour before landfall NHC had classed the storm as a Category 4 Major Hurricane (sustained winds 113 to 136 knots). In the immediate area of the eyewall was another NOAA Weather Buoy (NOAA station 42036). That buoy recorded maximum sustained winds under 50 knots and a maximum gust of 60.3 knots over the past 24 hours.

If you are in the path of a hurricane that is officially STILL a hurricane FOUR hours after it crossed over onto land, you might want to close shop too! On the other hand, if the storm is causing a lot of rain and winds up to 35 miles an hour (like reported by NOAA station VAT in Valdosta, GA with the storm right there), maybe you would remain open!

Do I need to buy a bigger tinfoil hat?

Congratulations on putting together this insightful analysis. You do also realize that it is just as possible that the weather bouy in question was erroneously reporting wind speed? There were only about fifty hurricane hunter flights in and around the storm leading up to landfall; all of which were measuring wind speed among other parameters. Also, dopler radar from multiple locations would be useful in fairly accurate estimations of conditions.

Storm surge along the west coast from Ft. Myers all the way to the big bend support winds much in excess of those reported at the bouy in question. Of course postmortem damage reports from the area of landfall will tell the real tale of just what it was really like.

If you are ever unfortunate enough to witness one of these storms up close and have property and loved ones in harms way your tone may very well change.