2007 Season Disappointing - AGW crowd silent
By wennejunk Posted in Miscellanea — Comments (26) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
As late as May, 2007 was predicted to be another intense, scary hurricane season.
We saw the same dire predictions for 2006.
Once the Gorical and his minions linked Katrina's strength and devastation to Anthropogenic Global Warming (instead of random chance, long term weather cycles, State Government incompetence and foolish citizens) a fairly high bar had been set for Nature to comply with.
The world as we know is was going to end soon and Nature had to deliver spectacular devastation to keep with the agenda. Unfortunately for AGWers, she is apparently on vacation, still resting from 2005.
In 2006, she failed to deliver and you could almost sense the disappointment of the AGW crowd as they mouthed the obligatory "we're glad the season was milder than expected but the world is still on the edge of destruction" statements.
Before the official season began, 2007 was predicted (by NOAA) to deliver 13-17 named storms, 7-10 Hurricanes and 3-5 Major hurricanes (Cat 3 or higher). The sense of anticipation on the part of the AGW crowd was palpable, they would be vindicated against those heathens who failed to bow before their God!
In August, NOAA revised their prediction downward to a hopeful 13-16 storms, 7-9 hurricanes and 3-5 major storms.
Officially, there's another month to go, but the chances of devastation are starting to thin.
To date, there have been 13 named storms, 4 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes, well below predictions.
AGW advocates, failing to experience the destruction they had hoped for have had to dig out other bits of trivia to prop up their corpse:
- Huberto was the fastest growing Hurricane in history
- 2007 was only the fourth time with more than one category 5 storm
- 2007 was the only time two Atlantic hurricanes have ever made landfall at Category 5 strength in the same season.
Other than this, the sky is falling discussion has been muted.
Remember this next time something bad happens in the world of weather and AGW is suddenly to blame.
I'm sure we will get the "we're all going to die" coverage anyway.
Have they figured out how to scaremonger atlantic hurricanes up in Alaska yet ?
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"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
it needs to stay at tropical depression strength until landfall and then move over north Georgia to help us refill Lake Lanier.
The south desperately needs the rain from a good, soaking tropical storm to reverse the drought. Yeah, there might be some damage...but as bad as things are it would probably be worth it.
Nature has its ways of balancing things...
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I'm not voting for Ron Paul because it's not expressly prescribed in the Constitution.
-- Mark Hemingway, The Corner (NRO)
this time of year were on the East Coast, CNN would have called the "End of the World" already. Sustained winds in the 20-30 kt. range and gusts in the forties and fifties with heavy rain are an every few days event as one low after another comes up from the Pacific Basin and slams into Southeast Alaska and the Gulf of Alaska coast. It's just what happens at the equinox as the Sun leaves the Northern Hemisphere, which begins to cool, and begins to warm the Southern Hemisphere, causing low after low to form. They're typhoons on the East Coast of Asia and rainy, windy days here. The big difference is that the tropical lows hit land over warm water in the East and South, while here they spend a few thousand miles over cooler or cold water before they hit land. Even so, it isn't uncommon for one to come ashore with what would be hurricane force winds and rain amounts elsewhere. I live in the valley of the Mendenhall Glacier about a mile from the face. When the low is offshore (south and west), the wind can howl down the valley pretty good, so you make sure you have a good grip on doors when you open them. Like everyone else, I just get all the summer stuff put away, the loose stuff secured, put a couple of extra lines and fenders on the boat, and make sure I have plenty of gas for the generator. Beyond that, life goes on. It's calm today and not raining much, so I have to get up on the roof and find and patch a leak over my garage that showed up a couple of days ago - also an annual fall ritual.
The BIG AGW thing here is the melting of the Arctic Ice Pack. Of course, nobody knows the historic state of the ice pack, but we know it is a disaster awaiting us. It is mostly just a hook to get the Polar Bear declared an endangered species so that any oil development on the Arctic Slope and off the Arctic Coast, including the State lands, will be scrutinized under the Endangered Species Act. Thinking by the Greenies clearly is that, like '74, enough of a disruption or high enough prices will cause even a Democrat Congress to authorized development, so they want a fall back to have the Courts block it.
In Vino Veritas
The CNN Eason Jordan ethos keeps touting Chicken Little meteorology endlessly and the continuing insanity of the ANWR situation may actually expand to Arctic seabed exploration and extraction, as the Luddites attempt to peddle Malthusianism of the weather variety.
Marxism metathesizes in myriad manifestations.
but not the US. I'm curious...
Did anyone notice how the entire average hurricane track shifted way south this year? I don't recall any serious hurricane threats along the US Atlantic seaboard this year.
I have never heard of Castro or any other tin dictator complain about how Gringo's automobiles are goofing up their weather systems, not even as a poorly constructed AGW talking point. Perhaps they aren't so quick to blame their weather on anything beyond a tempestuous and fickle ocean god (not to mention a real love of vintage automobiles).
that one of the Goracle acolytes will soon start proclaiming that the lack of hurricanes is due to man-made global warming, and the droughts and dry weather in the southeast and southern California would be history if only there was more rain from the now-departed hurricanes.
“I consider looseness with words no less of a defect than looseness of the bowels” - John Calvin
That global warming will cause it to rain more, which will result in more vegetation growth, which will result in bigger fires as there is more fuel to burn. So you can't win either way. Not enough rain causes fires and too much rain causes fires.
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Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself. - Milton Friedman
...AGW is responsible for LESS rainfall. The reason?...
Warmer air can hold a greater capacity of water vapor. More water stays in the air, therefore, less rainfall. That's the theory.
Of course anyone who studied more than one year of science since the second grade (e.g. people who don't become senators or journalists) knows that the most humid places in the world produce the most volume and the most frequent rainfall (e.g. Hawaii, the Amazon.) That's more to the point considering how cold fronts don't bound through those regions, knocking the water from the air.
It's too bad scientists like me have to waste their time arguing with almost religious adherence to bad concepts. That's why many of us stop trying, or never start trying.
As you say, it makes no sense. So I wonder who said it?
There certainly are predictions that AGW will cause less rainfall in some areas. Particularly areas that rely on mid-latitude westerly oceanic winds, which may shift towards the poles.
Saharan dust storms are responsible for the lack of hurricanes.
Duh. Everybody knows that. Here's how it works:
Theory predicts X.
Actual outcome is 1/X.
Distort theory to predict 1/X.
All hail the theory.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Scientific Method. Thank you.
It's such a fine line between stupid and clever. - David St. Hubbins
Eliminate the facts
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"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
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Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself. - Milton Friedman
just who it was making all those hurricane predictions? Was it a bunch of AGW tin hats?
Either way, I'm not exactly sure how GW is supposed increase the frequency and intensity of hurricanes anyway. Here's my quandry: hurricanes are just the consequence of large, organized heat exchanges between the lower (i.e. surface level) and upper levels of the troposhere, and the upper level is warming even faster than the lower. Since the difference is getting smaller, it follows that less heat can be transferred, consequently less energy for hurricanes. Yet the GW crowd keeps "predicting" more frequent and energetic storms, and yet we aren't really seeing them (at least not in the Atlantic, aside from 2005).
NOAA was the big name. CSU as well.
Search 2007 hurricane season at Wikipedia to get the actual predictions by agency and date and updates.
I saw the coverage this morning of the depression out in the Caribbean and it brought to mind all the scare stories from late spring....and from last year's late spring as well.
The AGW crowd roars when things go bad - it's Global warming don't you see? - but is pretty much silent when nature doesn't play along with their fantasy.
These predictions of hurricanes have little to do with AGW. They make them a few months ahead using current knowledge of hurricane-generating conditions. Long term AGW issues have little role. And the two examples you've chosen particularly don't fit your narrative. The most notable hurricane forecaster at CSU is Bill Gray, and at the NOAA Hurricane Center Chris Landsea. As you'll see from the links, both are well regarded in the world of AGW sceptics. And I think their forecasts this year are looking pretty reasonable. That says nothing pro or con AGW
But the broader proposition that AGW scientists have been forecasting more frequent hurricanes also doesn't work. The IPCC AR4 report is online now. It is more explanatory than earlier releases, and includes a FAQ. And in the answer to Q10.1 they say
There is evidence from modelling studies that future tropical
cyclones could become more severe, with greater wind speeds and more intense precipitation. Studies suggest that such changes may already be underway; there are indications that the average number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes per year has increased over the past 30 years. Some modelling studies have projected a decrease in the number of tropical cyclones globally due to the increased stability of the tropical troposphere in a warmer climate, characterised by fewer weak storms and greater numbers of intense storms. A number of modelling studies have also projected a general tendency for more intense but fewer storms outside the tropics, with a tendency towards more extreme wind events and higher ocean waves in several regions in association with those deepened cyclones.
In other words, there may actually be fewer hurricanes, but may be of greater intensity. Well, it doesn't prove much, there were two cat 5 ones this year, which is unusual.
that it is entirely reasonable that we are not able to forecast the rough number of hurricanes this year but we are able to forecast the temperature to a fraction of a degree some decades in the future?
Or are saying that NOAA doesn't really do science and modeling so we shouldn't expect them to be correct?
"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition." -- Rudyard Kipling
I don't think scientists are claiming to forecast temperatures to a fraction of a degree decades hence. One of the complaints about AGW is that they can't make these precise forecasts. Part of the reason is that they can only do scenarios of future carbon burning; that depends on human decisions, not a physical process. But there are also real uncertainties in climate sensitivity. What is fairly well understood is the amount of heat being added to the earth's surface environment. And that has to cause warming.
The "their" in "their fantasy" would be William Gray, then, the so-called guru of seasonal hurricane prediction. He's had some success, but admits he missed on the last two seasons.
You can criticize the AGW crowd for making noise whenever extreme weather blows up, but you can't laugh at Gray for that reason. He claims that GW has nothing to do with hurricanes; saying that seasonal fluctuations result from other natural cycles.
A lack of hysterical predictions makes it harder for NOAA to justify their budget. Gray's innacuracy can at least be partially blammed on the politicization of climate forecasting. He predicts doomsday, or he isn't producing what the industry currently wants.
“The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men."
Thats AGW in a nutshell Predict Doomsday or your budgets gone.
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"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
Anyone Remember this year's first named storm? A, of course, for Andrea. You may recall that the storm's full name was Subtropical storm Andrea. In other words, it never got up to strength to refer to it as a Tropical storm, so it never really reached the qualifications of becoming named. But once the storm was named, "A" was on the books, and a new way of stacking the deck in terms of number of named storms in a given year was born, early in 2007.
It happened at least once this year that I read in the media of a storm brewing in the Atlantic, already named because the PREDICTION was that it would achieve tropical storm strengh. Of course, looking on a NOAA website, I could never find a warning track until a day or two later. Somehow the reporters knew first.
Finding this, and looking at the latest infrared, or visible satellite images, I often found storms with so little orgainization, that the barely qualifying sustained winds (if only for two seconds) and the fact that it was in the ocean, were the only possible criteria for making a name in the first place.
After this, predictions on tracking were so woefully bad this year, it's become apparent to me that whatever criteria were being applied this year were lessons that were taken from the 2005 hurricane season. In other words, TREND models from 2004 and 2005(worst case scenarios), rather than models based on real atmospheric data, are being employed.
You may have also noticed that once hurricane tracks are updated, the older often abbysmal predictions are erased, and so we have a lovely self-fulfilling prophecy in the making with each storm.
So this year, checking hurricane tracks day by day meant seeing entirely different stories developing almost on a daily basis.
Neither weather prediction, nor media can ever be addressed this way and remain (or ever claim to be) reliable.
As far as I can tell.
For 2006 and 2007, in spite of the continued increases in both fossil fuel use and atmospheric CO2, were not only weak hurricane seasons, but they were among THE WEAKEST RECORDED HURRICANE SYSTEMS IN THE 100-YEAR HISTORY OF WEATHER PREDICTION.
Now, THAT's an inconvenient truth!
Sub-tropical storms are a special designation that refers to a Hybrid storm which contains both warm-core and cold-core characteristics.
Suffice to say, a sub-tropical storm can have sustained winds of 60 - 70 mph and cause quite a bit of rain and flooding. (a sub-tropical storm that reaches 74 mph will be called a hurricane even if the system is still hybrid).
Do not confuse the terminology to imply that a sub-tropical storm is somehow weaker than a tropical storm.
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"The bass, the rock, the mic, the treble, I like my coffee black, just like my Metal." - MSI
Just a heads up, the Sea Surface Tempratures are still running about 1 degree above normal throughout most of the atlantic. with a few areas at 2 degrees above normal.
There have been a few reasons why the season has seemed so quiet, despite having 2 catagory 5 hurricanes.
1) Stronger than normal Bermuda High Pressure. That has forced a lot of storms to trek along a due west path forcing them into Mexico rather than recurving them into the Gulf.
2) Extremely High Shear throughout the Atlantic. and with the storms forming at a higher latitude, they're tending to drift into unfavorable wind conditions before they can pose any danger.
3) Utter Luck with formation Location. We've had several storms form very close to land and simply not have enough time to organize and strengthen. Humberto went from an open wave at 5AM to a depression at 11AM to a tropical storm at 2PM to a hurricane at 1:15AM Had the storm formed another 50 miles further south and had another 12 - 24 hours, it was rapidly on the way to a Wilma like rapid intensification.
4) We're not done with the season yet. While it may seem like a slow season. We're up to 14 tropical storms and 16 depressions. since 1969 (the beginning of the Satellite era) we've only had 6 seasons that have had more tropical storms: 1969, 1995, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005. (and 2005 was the year there were 4 storms that developed in November and December)
5) Climatology is NOT the same as weather forecasts. Don't confuse the two together. Using the lack of an extreme season doesn't advance that global warming isn't causing changes. Just as any global warming advocate should not point to the prior seasons as evidence that global warming is causing change (particularly since correlation and causation hasn't been established in either direction).
6) Now mind you. We've had 3 Cat 5's in the 70's, 3 in the 80's, 2 in the 90's, and 6 so far in the 00's (again keeping with decades that are in the Satellite era).
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"The bass, the rock, the mic, the treble, I like my coffee black, just like my Metal." - MSI
new storm forming in the Atlantic today. Get ready for "we're all going to die" coverage.
In Vino Veritas