2011 hurricane season makes record books
(CNS): Having made it to the letter ‘G’ without a tropical storm reaching hurricane status the 2011 Atlantic Hurricane Season is already a record breaker. Following Tropical Storm Gert’s degeneration on Tuesday evening this season has become the first on record where none of the first seven tropical storms intensified into a hurricane. Although forecasters were predicting a relatively busy season, especially in the Caribbean region, weather experts say there has been too much dry air or wind shear over the tropics so far and storms have popped up in places where intensification was unlikely.
However, Monday marked the start of what is sometimes called the Cape Verde season, when the most powerful storms tend to be spawned off the coast of West Africa and forecasters are expecting at least one hurricane before the end of this month. Given that the first hurricane normally develops by 10 Aug and that the predictions were for around ten hurricanes this season if those forecasters are right the next three months will be very busy.
On Wednesday evening an area of cloudiness and showers associated with a tropical wave over the west-central Caribbean was becoming better organized the National Hurricane Centre in Miami was predicting but forecasters said there was no evidence of a surface circulation. Nevertheless the weather experts said environmental conditions remained conducive for gradual development during the next couple of days and gave the system a medium chance (40%) of becoming a tropical cyclone before the weekend as it heads west.
On 4 August NOAA issued its updated outlook for the season and raised the number of expected named storms from its pre-season outlook in May. Confidence for an above-normal season increased from 65 percent in May to 85 percent. Also, the expected number of named storms increased from 12-18 in May to 14-19, and the expected number of hurricanes has increased from 6-10 in May to 7-10.
These ranges are indicative of an active season, and extend well above the long-term seasonal averages of 11 named storms, six hurricanes and two major hurricanes,” NOAA stated in its revised prediction,
“The atmosphere and Atlantic Ocean are primed for high hurricane activity during August through October,” said Gerry Bell, Ph.D., lead seasonal hurricane forecaster at the Climate Prediction Centre. “Storms through October will form more frequently and become more intense than we’ve seen so far this season.”
Category: Science and Nature
That's probably a very good thing, since our hurricane shelter in Frank Sound didn't get finished because we had to "donate" to another one in Bodden Town. And the one in the Brac won't be finished because we had to 'donate" $1.3 million to somebody or other's church in West Bay. And now we're paying off peoples mortgages because they now have a second mortgage payment called a CUC bill, and if they lose their homes because of this then Government will be responsible and government cannot be responsible because the unfinished hurricane shelters won't hold them all, hurricane or no hurricane. Meanwhile the churches are living large on our money. We're making progress folks. It's called "good governance". Oh, I almost forgot, "good governance" includes getting our backsides sued to hell and back by several corporations simultaneously, and giving away $40 million in concessions so we can bring in more work permit holders. It really doesn't look like we'll EVER get our schools snd hurricane shelters finished so we can have some educated leaders in our children's future. Not to worry though, folks, I mean we did manage to at least temporarily stop the North Sound dredging madness and the East End port madness and even the oil refinery madness hasn't smoked for a while. We're making progress, folks. Dear God, please spare usfrom those hurricanes until we can get our act sorted out. We understand it's going to take years and an altogether new government but our faith in your love for us is steadfast. We understand that you blessed us with our current Premier so we would finally have no choice but to turn to you, and we are doing that, with all our hearts, and we pray that our churches, if not our government, will do so too. Amen.