Projections continue to show a historic storm system from the Mid-Atlantic through New England beginning this weekend continuing throughout the week http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2012/10/a-more-perfect-storm-will-strike.html . Three questions remain, contingent on the track: (1) Does Hurricane Sandy make landfall farther south before it can interact over the Atlantic with the approaching low-pressure system (2) (3) Does the timing coincident with astronomical high tides? Regardless, it'll be a memorable storm, depending on how those things plays out will determine how rare, destructive and deadly it will be. The National Weather Service office responsible for NYC released this: http://www.erh.noaa.gov/okx/products/static.txt .
Many projections are for the hybrid nor'easter to have a low pressure center the equivalent of a category 3 hurricane (winds will not be as strong because they'll diffuse over a larger area). The (Delmarva-)New Jersey-Long Island area remains the most likely center of landfall and thus would see the worst storm surge. There is the potential that this could be the equivalent of a weak category 2 hurricane http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/mandias/38hurricane/storm_surge_maps.html in terms of storm surge due to rapid deepening (pressure drop) and a broad wind field acting to pile up a significant volume/mass of water. In the worst case, this would be Zone A bordering into Zone B for NYC: http://www.nyc.gov/html/oem/html/hazards/storms_evaczones.shtml . There is precedent for such high storm surges from non-tropical storms, notably https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Storm_of_the_Century#Gulf_of_Mexico . Other storms of comparison include the Columbus Day storm in the Northwest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbus_Day_Storm_of_1962 (winds will not be that strong but surge and rain will be greater), the New England hurricane of 1938 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_England_Hurricane_of_1938, Hurricane Hazel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Hazel , and the Gale of 1878 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gale_of_1878 . If H. Sandy stays out to sea (long enough, yet eventually moves inland) to optimally amplify the extratropical cyclone (nor'easter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nor%27easter ), this may be the worst storm during most people's lifetimes. In addition to the storm surge (would be 10-15 ft under worst case), significant rainfall (5-10+") over a wide area will cause substantial inland flooding as well as act to soften the ground, which will increase the number of uprooted treas, especially since so many still have foliage. Sustained hurricane strength winds are a possibility. At the very least, expect widespread flooding and (perhaps lengthy) multi-state power outages (it will exceed the outages from the June derecho http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?src=eoa-iotd&id=78445 ). It's likely to surpass the 1991 Perfect Storm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Perfect_Storm under all projections as is the prediction for $1billion+ in damages consistent regardless of eventual severity. In addition to the Capital Weather Gang http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang (the Washington Post has slipped so far, but this is a good source on weather) another source to consider is NOAA's clearinghouse: http://www.noaa.gov/stormcentral/ . Twitter, of course, is unbeatable if one takes the time to maximize results https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Sandy&src=hash . On 25-Oct-12 20:22, Michael Smith wrote: > Yikes. I think I'll take the little boat to her winter quarters in the > Bronx a little early this year. Like, tomorrow. That was a good idea. Do it no later than Sunday if you haven't already. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
