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Tracking Hurricanes From A Distance - Hurricane RitaYou don't need to be in a hurricane's path to see what's happening! Elsewhere I mentioned that the vicinity of a major hurricane is no place to be sitting watching the weather with one eye and your home weather station with the other (Hurricane Tracking) . If your outdoor sensors don't fail to high winds and flying debris, you'll almost certainly lose power, and whatever records you may have obtained. In those circumstances it's obviously best to tie everything down, lock up, and move to a safer location.
In late September, 2005, Severe Hurricane Rita swept through the Gulf of Mexico. Although it caused a great amount of damage, it wasn't as destructive as Hurricane Katrina earlier in the month. But for a time it was even more powerful. I spent a few hours, on and off, following Rita's progress from the Florida Straits to her landfall near the Texas-Louisiana border, and I found it so interesting I thought I'd tell you a little about it, and give you a few links so you can do the same next time an interesting hurricane shows up in the area. WATCHING RITA The Storm Major Hurricane Rita first came to notice on September 16th as an area of disturbed weather north of Puerto Rico. By the 18th she had developed enough to be identified as Tropical Depression 18, yet another in the busy hurricane season of 2005. At around 4am on September 24th, Rita came ashore at Sabine Pass on the Texas - Louisiana border as a major Category 3 hurricane. For a while, she was the third most intense hurricane since accurate records have been kept. The effects of Rita cannot be taken lightly. Even though Rita weakened and crossed the shoreline away from major population centers, over a million evacuations disturbed many lives, including those relocated from New Orleans after Katrina, who had to move again. Wind damage and flooding from heavy rains and storm surge were severe and the damage bill will be high, while the disruption to people's lives and to commerce is never easily overcome.
Casualties were fortunately very few, the worst being a
terrible bus fire during the evacuation when 24 elderly people died. New Orleans was flooded again, and the Florida Keys were awash for a while. I'm sure everyone's thoughts and sympathy go out to those whose lives have been disrupted, but things could have been far, far worse. For several days the major population area of Houston/Galveston was a likely landfall. Had this occurred, the damage would have been far greater, particularly in the low lying islands and shoreline that form the foundations of Galveston. What I Saw, and Where I Found It Rita can almost be considered as the Perfect Hurricane. She started off slowly, became significant as she passed almost exactly up the middle of the Florida Straits, then exploded into a Category 5 hurricane as she made her way through the Gulf of Mexico, at times almost covering the Gulf with inflowing and outflowing cloud. She exhibited most of the features of a full blown hurricane,
and grew and died in a region where satellite, radar and aerial reconnaissance information is of excellent quality and is frequently updated.
Add to that the carefully
I began watching Rita as she approached the Florida Keys as a Category 1 Hurricane. This was very similar to the track of Katrina about three weeks earlier, and from the point of view of a weather observer, the possibilities were promising. I won't bore you with a long description of what could be seen on satellite images as Rita developed and moved across the Gulf of Mexico, but here are a few highlights ...
Now I didn't watch every move that Rita made, although I can
understand how some might. There is no need to sit glassy eyed in front of a screen, because much of the imagery is saved on ten part loops which can give a five hour sequence of the progress and development of a hurricane. You may like to try this yourself the next time a hurricane is brewing in the western Atlantic. Here are some of the most useful links which will help you becomes a well informed hurricane spectator. NDBC - National Data Buoy Center - this page shows locations of buoys and other automatic weather reporting facilities. Digging down from the maps will provide you with the weather data from individual buoys in the vicinity of a hurricane. http://http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/index.shtml/ NHC - National Hurricane Center. The NHC issues forecasts, public advisories, forecast advisories, discussions and strike probabilities during the hurricane season. You can find them, and much more, here; http://www.nhc.noaa.gov For archives of recent hurricanes, including Rita, visit this page; http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2005/index.shtml For specific warnings and forecasts, and radar images and loops, visit the appropriate NWS pages. This page shows their location; http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/ A handy guide to hurricane weather is the MESO site. Apart from links to maps and images, you can also find links to Brian McNoldy's excellent bulletins on current hurricane and tropical storm activity. Highly recommended. http://mcwar.org/tropics/ And finally, I have found the forum discussion on active hurricanes at WeatherMatrix to be very interesting and informative. They cover plenty of other topics as well. Check them out at; http://www.weathermatrix.net/phpBB2/index.php Hurricanes, cyclones and typhoons occur in many other parts of the world as well, and most national weather organisations provide similar information to that in the USA. The frequency of data and the length of image loops is unlikely to be as comprehensive, but there's always plenty to see. |