FEMA’s next-generation trailer
The Atlantic hurricane season will be exceptionally active this year, according to a British forecasting group, raising the possibility that killer storms like Hurricane Katrina could again threaten the United States.
London-based forecaster Tropical Storm Risk on Tuesday said the six-month season, which begins on June 1, was expected to bring 17 tropical storms, of which nine will strengthen into hurricanes with winds of at least 74 miles (119 km) per hour.
Four of those are expected to become more destructive “intense” hurricanes, TSR said.
Other experts, including hurricane forecast pioneer Dr. William Gray and his team at Colorado State University, have also warned that the 2007 hurricane season is likely to be busier-than-average.
Now, we can hear from the folks who forecast weather by sticking a wet finger in the air. Or in their ear?
Just like they predicted the last season would be busier than usual too? I’ve learned to take the “wait and see” route in all cases regarding predicting the weather. It was supposed to be in the 70s today… well it’s 56 right now.
Yeah, and they could just as equally be wrong.
I remember last season being predicted as normal to below normal. Not sure where we are getting our information, in fact….
“We foresee another very active Atlantic basin tropical cyclone season in 2006,” states a report from a team including long-time forecasting guru William Gray of Colorado State University. “However, we do not expect to see as many landfalling major hurricanes in the United States as we have experienced in 2004 and 2005.”
The scientist who produce Weather and Climate predictions have ZERO credibility with me. I have seen more wrong predictions then right ones. Statistically speaking, you could flip a coin and get better results. Accurate Weather and Climate prediction is beyond the current technology. Maybe some day, but not today. They would have better luck predicting earthquakes and horse racing results.
Looks like the superstition crowd is here, first. The folks making these predictions earn their living providing numbers to insurance actuaries. Something folks might have noticed if they read the linked
article. If they ran statistically behind reality, they’d be out of business, soon.
I doubt if any of the major insurance companies amass the capital in their vaults – by listening to coin flippers and those who base their interpretation of data on what’s happening outside their office window. That is, if you’re high enough up that all important pecking order to get a window. 🙂
As a meteorologist that reads this blog, I feel I should offer just a bit of insight into hurricane predictions.
While there are other factors, most of these predictions are based off the fact that we are going into the cool cycle of ENSO (El Nino/Southern Oscillation). The cool cycle is typically referred to as La Nina. Typically, during this cool cycle, upper-level winds in the tropics get weaker. Less wind sheer in the tropics is benifical to tropical cyclone formation. Hence, the predition of a “more active” hurricane season.
Of course, people seem to quickly make the leap from “more active season” to “The US is going to get blown off the map by hurricanes this year”. Yes, that a bit of an exaggeration, but you understand my point. Even if there was 20 major hurricanes in the Atlantic, it doesn’t mean that any of them will make landfall.
All of the 2006 predictors quote in Wikipedia thought it would be an above normal season.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Atlantic_hurricane_season
5 – You’re pretty high up the pecking order, god. What do you see in store for us? And how come your acts tend to be so destructive? What, you got something against the sons of Adam or something?
Eve was a lot more fun than Adam.
If you care to continue your sincere interest in long range climate studies, NOAA is really a great place to start. ENSO questions are discussed here – and you can also subscribe to their newsletter as I do.
According to Dr. Jeff Masters, founder of the Weather Underground web site, the 6 month out forecasts have zero skill in their predictions. At 3 months they just start to have a little skill. Not until the season gets underway do the predictions for the remainder of the season become useful.
The only ones excited about these 6 month predictions are the media morons looking for a good story. But the real story is that the predictions, at this point are essentially random guesses, regardless of the technology put into them.
11 – and he’s studying to be a Yogi on the side. That helps even more.
I seem to recall something called the ‘butterfly effect’ whereby a butterfly in China flaps its wings and alters the weather in the Mojave a few days later. Chaos theory sure makes it tough to predict the weather. That notwithstanding, meteorologists sure have come a long way in the last 20 years. Thanks, Cray!
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wforcst0.htm
Weather forecasting wont do any of us any good until we have complete dominion over the weather… also, how many more catagory 5 storms will it take to get some decent storm cleanup legislation passed?