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Tropical Storm Melissa

Melissa is poised to be a dangerous storm. Right now, the majority of ensemble members of all major models anticipate a landfall on Jamaica. 8 PM NHC update has her hitting Jamaica as a mid-grade C4, 140 MPH. With nearly 3 million people and being located nearly 100 miles away from Cuba and over 100 miles away from Haiti, which is grappling with internal conflict, emergency response groups may face severe difficulty in delivering aid to the island in the wake of a major impact. Delivery of supplies by sea can be slow, while delivery by air is sometimes inadequate to meet immediate needs, and may be complicated by damage or obstruction of landing strips (see the impacts of Dorian on Marsh Harbour Intl in 2019).
1761352047596.png1761352143843.png
 
Cyclonic Paracosm said:
would this maybe allow it to start strengthening faster
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Yep, that's how it works - shear (winds blowing across the storm at altitude) tend to disrupt the vertical stacking needed for a storm to intensify. The longer Melissa takes to get "stacked" vertically, the better. Once stacked, intensification will accelerate. A lot of times you'll see them "pulse" like this, when they blow up real fast try to stack, top gets blown off, and it starts over. Once they stack, then they can deal with shear better. (and in this case, shear is relaxing too.) Folks smarter than me are probably cringing at what I oversimplified in that explanation, but that's the basics.
 
Blountwolf said:
Yep, that's how it works - shear (winds blowing across the storm at altitude) tend to disrupt the vertical stacking needed for a storm to intensify. The longer Melissa takes to get "stacked" vertically, the better. Once stacked, intensification will accelerate. A lot of times you'll see them "pulse" like this, when they blow up real fast try to stack, top gets blown off, and it starts over. Once they stack, then they can deal with shear better. (and in this case, shear is relaxing too.) Folks smarter than me are probably cringing at what I oversimplified in that explanation, but that's the basics.
Click to expand...
That's not something I've heard of before.

Seems odd too. I’d think that would hamper rapid intensification.
 
tornado examiner said:
That's not something I've heard of before.

Seems odd too. I’d think that would hamper rapid intensification.
Click to expand...
It absolutely does. The longer it gets sheared the better (assuming you are AGAINST intensification). I am - I like Jamaica.
 
So here's the delicate balance that slow moving storms walk - if they go slow, they create upwelling, which brings cooler water up from below, which they don't "feed" on as well, so they don't strengthen as much. Usually. That's why folks who watch these look at TCHP, or tropical cyclone heat potential, which is water temperature at depth.

Notice I said usually.

This water is cooking, even at depth. Anomalously so.
1761359310990.png
 
Blountwolf said:
So here's the delicate balance that slow moving storms walk - if they go slow, they create upwelling, which brings cooler water up from below, which they don't "feed" on as well, so they don't strengthen as much. Usually. That's why folks who watch these look at TCHP, or tropical cyclone heat potential, which is water temperature at depth.

Notice I said usually.

This water is cooking, even at depth. Anomalously so.
View attachment 47732
Click to expand...
oh thats comforting, so once it doesn't have stuff against it we could see this more or so explode....
 
Blountwolf said:
So here's the delicate balance that slow moving storms walk - if they go slow, they create upwelling, which brings cooler water up from below, which they don't "feed" on as well, so they don't strengthen as much. Usually. That's why folks who watch these look at TCHP, or tropical cyclone heat potential, which is water temperature at depth.

Notice I said usually.

This water is cooking, even at depth. Anomalously so.
View attachment 47732
Click to expand...
Yeah this is the worst part. Even though it's sat still that won’t dampen it's potential with how hot and deep this warm pool is.
 
Cyclonic Paracosm said:
oh thats comforting, so once it doesn't have stuff against it we could see this more or so explode....
Click to expand...
That's exactly the expectation. Here's the track overlaying the TCHP map.
1761359729763.png
 
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