Category 4 Giovanna battering Madagascar
Earth's most dangerous storm of 2012 is Tropical Cyclone Giovanna, which is bearing down on Madagascar as a powerful Category 4 storm with 145 mph winds. Giovanna is predicted to hit a heavily populated portion of the east coast of the island near 22 GMT tonight as a Category 3 storm, then move inland, passing near the capital of Antananarivo as a Category 1 storm on Tuesday morning. The outer spiral bands of the storm have already moved over the island, bringing heavy rains and gusty winds.
Figure 1. Visible image from NASA's Terra satellite of Tropical Cyclone Giovanna approaching Madagascar, taken at 6:35 UTC Monday February 13, 2012. At the time, Giovanna was a Category 4 storm with 145 mph winds. Image credit: NASA.
Figure 2. Webcam view of the skies over the Andila Beach Hotel in northwest Madagascar, taken at 6:15pm local time on Monday February 13, 2012. Image credit: Andilana Beach Hotel.
The forecast: not good
Recent microwave satellite imagery (Figure 3) shows that Giovanna has concentric eyewalls, and it likely that the inner eyewall will collapse today as the storm undergoes an eyewall replacement cycle. This process should gradually weaken the storm, and I expect Giovanna will weaken slightly to a still very dangerous Category 3 storm with 125 - 130 mph winds at landfall. However, the eyewall replacement cycle will spread out the storm's hurricane-force winds over a larger area, increasing the storm surge. A 70-mile long swath of the coast that is heavily populated will receive sustained hurricane-force winds tonight. Rainfall amounts in excess of eight inches in a 24-hour period are expected along the center of Giovanna's path. These rains will cause extensive flooding and major damage to the country, and the storm is likely to be one of the top three most expensive disasters in Malagasy history. The damage potential is higher than for previous storms of similar intensity, due to the considerable deforestation Madagascar has experienced over the past 30 years. Madagascar lost 8.3% of its forest cover between 1990 and 2010 and is now just 22% forested, according to mongabay.com. Flood waters run off quicker from deforested land, reach higher heights, and cause greater damage.
Figure 3. Microwave satellite image of Tropical Cyclone Giovanna taken at 12:30 UTC (7:30 am EST) Monday, February 13, 2012. The echo-free eye is surrounded by two concentric eyewalls, the sign of a storm undergoing an eyewall replacement cycle. Image credit: Navy Research Lab, Monterrey.
Madagascar's tropical cyclone history
The strongest and deadliest tropical cyclone ever recorded in Madagascar was Tropical Cyclone Gafilo, which hit the northern end of the island on March 7, 2004, as a Category 5 storm with 160 mph winds. Galfilo dumped up to 20 inches of rain on the island, and its winds and flooding rains killed 363 people and did $250 million in damage, making it the deadliest and second most expensive storm in Madagascar's history. Gafilo's central pressure of 895 mb made it the second strongest tropical cyclone ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere, behind the 890 mb central pressure of Tropical Cyclone Zoe of December 2002, which affected Fiji and the Solomon Islands. With a central pressure of 937 mb, Giovanna is a much less intense storm than Gafilo was.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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So you're saying the chart in wikipedia is completely backwards?
the temperature spike on 1998 on the chart makes sense because 1998 was at that time the hottest year on record, and still is one of the top 5, and you can count left and right on each of them to find the other ones.
The high temperature spike is 1998, because 1998 was the hottest year on record.
If 1998 is supposed to be la nina, then it should be blue.
And if ou lost track of the years, you can just count up or down from 1998, which is easily the hottest year up to that time.
Either way, one of these products is completely wrong...on EVERY freaking year...
Additionally, the far right bar is 2011, which is la nina like it should be, and if you count backwards, 1998 is indeed the tall red bar.
ME, ME, ME!
Newer designs make meltdown pretty much impossible. If we can utilize thorium then meltdowns become physically impossible.
Yes, new designs probably eliminate meltdowns due to loss of grid/backup generator power. But they do not solve the problem of leaks nor fix the problem of hazardous waste.
They also do not solve the problems of cost and time to implement.
We could reprocess spent fuel but that adds to the cost.
While I agree, this relies on a) No one throwing up idiotic political roadblocks, b) the storage technology will exist, and c) assuming that there will be enough fossil fuels to satisfy world demand without significantly increasing energy prices between then and now. This is also ignoring what impacts there could be from continued use of fossil fuels at an increasing rate for the next decades/centuries it will take to make a full transition.
Political roadblocks to renewables are falling right and left. Multiple attempts to create wind-damaging legislation in conservative states have failed. Republican governors are backing wind farms.
It's become clear that renewables turn a profit and create both jobs and tax revenues.
We have storage technology right now. Pump up works great and utility scale battery storage is beginning to be installed. As battery prices fall we'll see lots more battery storage coming on line.
And we're not looking at lots of decades, certainly not centuries for a full transition. It's something that could be done in 20-30 years. We can move from coal to renewables much faster than we can replace coal with nuclear.
With a combination of wind, solar, natural gas and increased efficiency we could get all our coal plants shut down in a couple of decades.
We can do it with natural gas, but wind and solar won't help all that much until we have the grid in place that can handle it. Sure, if you're just looking at MW numbers then it's possible, but transitioning takes a lot more than just producing the power. That's the easy part.
I don't think you realize how usable wind and solar are. We're already seeing them cut into fossil fuel usage. And both wind and solar are beginning to make grid power cheaper. Nuclear raises the cost of electricity.
It's sort of like electric cars. It would be far more efficient to have everyone drive electric cars and burn the fuel in a powerplant. But even assuming you had the battery tech for long drives and quick recharges, our grid would burst into flames if we tried to do this.
Well, there's no need to burn fuel in power plants to charge EVs. Renewables are perfect for EVs. Cars spend about 90% of their time parked which means that they are excellent for absorbing peak renewable input power. That creates more profit for wind and solar which, in turn, generates more installation.
As well, our grid is quite ready for EVs. A couple of studies have found that were our existing vehicles turned into EVs overnight the grid could easily charge 85% of all those vehicles.
Range, we have a couple of solutions even if battery capacity does not increase over the next few years.
First, there are PHEVs like the Chevy Volt that let most people do the vast majority of their driving with electricity but have the ability to run on liquid fuels when larger range is needed.
Second, we've got the technology to do very rapid battery exchanges. You can drive into one of Better Place's battery exchange stations and drive out with a charged battery faster than you can pump your tank full of gas.
But it's unlikely we'll need those approaches. Batteries almost certainly will increase to give us roughly double the current range of the Nissan Leaf, which is all that is needed. Once ranges reach ~175 miles and we have an adequate number of Level 3 charge stations along our highways one will be able to drive 500 miles with only a couple of short breaks.
Just use this official one and there will be no confusion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Atlantic_hurric ane_season
1992 was an STRONG el nino year, agreeing with the chart and me, which it says in the third sentence of the first paragraph.
which totally opposite of your link, which claims it was neutral.
Hey, maybe all the sites are wrong then, eh?
Either way, if you then use 1992 as a reference and count left or right, all the years I gave are el ninos on the chart...
Nice link...
But now you see the truth, which is that most of the years in fact were el nino anyway.
Addditionally, when you break it down that way, you see it's stupid and pointless to make a "storms don't happen in el nino years" rule, because half the years are BOTH because they flip-flopped.
If you average 1998's deviations it was actually still 0.1 positive average for the year, even though it shows more months as negative.
Link
hey everyone look at that.
It's a bit more complicated than this "year" was el nino or la nina, which is why the wiki graphic is a bit different.
Additionally, you STILL made my point, because:
1966
1969
1983
1992
were el ninos on that graphic too.
1998 changed, but the annual average was still positive, which might explain why it's red on the wiki graphic.
But that's a good reference, and I'll agree it's better than the wiki chart I had found right away...
But it still makes my own argument about strong storms even more valid, because it shows that there's more to it than just "was or was not an el nino".
1998 qualifies as both an strong el nino and a strong la nina, by those standards, depends on which season you look at.
2011 - La Nina.
2010 - La Nina.
2009 - El Nino.
2008 - Neutral.
2007 - La Nina.
2006 - El Nino
2005 - Neutral
2004 - El Nino
2003 - La Nina.
2002 - El Nino.
Anyone else see a semi-pattern?
One would assume that 2012 would be a El Nino by that pattern.
I wonder if we'll see an El Nino anytime soon. I don't think so.
CPC weekly update released today has a little warmer Nino 3.4 area at -1.0C, up from -1.2C of last week's update.
Link
Not a boring season..
If you guys actually cared about any basin other than the Atl. :(
Memorable storms from 2009:
Rick - second strongest EPac storm on record.
Nida - strongest November storm that I know of.
Melor - still stronger than any storm in 2011.
That is every storm in 2009 that had an intensity higher than 140kts. 2010 had Megi exceed 140kts, while 2011 had no storms exceed 140kts.
Yeah, we are headed towards El Niño right now, but all of the models show this gradually leveling off by August/September/October. In fact, after ASO, many models start taking us back down to La Niña.
PRECIPITABLE WATERS FINALLY RISE BACK ABOVE 1 INCH BY WEDNESDAY
NIGHT ON A SOUTHEAST FLOW. BY EARLY THURSDAY, A STRONGER
SHORTWAVE AND ASSOCIATED COLD FRONT WILL HAVE ADVANCED INTO THE
WESTERN FLORIDA PANHANDLE. THE GFS AND ECMWF CONTINUE TO COME
INTO BETTER AGREEMENT WITH THESE FEATURES AND SHOW WAVES OF LOW
PRESSURE DEVELOPING ALONG THE FRONT IN THE GULF OF MEXICO AND
PUSHING EAST NORTHEAST. THE PROGRESSION OF THE FRONT SHOULD TEND
TO SLOW AS IT BECOMES PARALLEL TO THE UPPER LEVEL FLOW. SO WHILE
THE BULK OF THE RICHEST MOISTURE MAY REMAIN TO OUR NORTH, AT
LEAST THROUGH SATURDAY, SLIGHT CHANCE POPS ARE CERTAINLY
WARRANTED FOR THE LOCAL AREA THIS WEEKEND. THE FRONT ITSELF MAY
NOT CLEAR SOUTH FLORIDA UNTIL LATE SUNDAY OR EARLY MONDAY.
It was a Modiki El Niño year.
Also interesting to note that 2004 had several strong Cape Verde hurricanes that hit the US rather than recurve (Frances, Ivan, Jeanne) Very destructive year, especialy considering it was el nino
Post #281.
"A new paper published in Science last Friday attempts to explain why some El Niño years see high Atlantic hurricane activity. "Impact of Shifting Patterns of Pacific Ocean Warming on North Atlantic Tropical Cyclones", by Georgia Tech researchers Hye-Mi Kim, Peter Webster, and Judith Curry, theorizes that Atlantic hurricane activity is sensitive to exactly where in the Pacific Ocean El Niño warming occurs. If the warming occurs primarily in the Eastern Pacific, near the coast of South America, the resulting atmospheric circulation pattern creates very high wind shear over the tropical Atlantic, resulting in fewer hurricanes. This pattern, called the Eastern Pacific Warming (EPW) pattern, occurred most recently during the El Niño years of 1997, 1987, and 1982 (Figure 1). In contrast, more warming occurred in the Central Pacific during the El Niño years of 2004, 2002, 1994, and 1991. The scientists showed that these Central Pacific Warming (CPW) years had lower wind shear over the Atlantic, and thus featured higher hurricane activity than is typical for an El Niño year. One of the paper's authors, Professor Peter J. Webster, said the variant Central Pacific Warming (CPW) El Niño pattern was discovered in the 1980s by Japanese and Korean researchers, who dubbed it modiki El Niño. Modiki is the Japanese word for "similar, but different"."
Serious question: Is it ever not raining in Puerto Rico?
:P
It hasn't stopped raining since 4:30. 4.8" so far. All of this falling into a river that passes through my town. Tomorrow's morning commute isn't going to be pretty.
It mostly rains in isolated mountain areas. First time in a while we've gotten generalized rains like this.
Not a drop so far in Santurce,but we have a flood advisory for NorthCentral PR.
FLOOD ADVISORY
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE SAN JUAN PR
802 PM AST MON FEB 13 2012
PRC047-101-105-143-140200-
/O.NEW.TJSJ.FA.Y.0003.120214T0002Z-120214T0200Z/
/00000.N.ER.000000T0000Z.000000T0000Z.000000T0000 Z.OO/
COROZAL PR-MOROVIS PR-NARANJITO PR-VEGA ALTA PR-
802 PM AST MON FEB 13 2012
THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN SAN JUAN HAS ISSUED AN
* URBAN AND SMALL STREAM FLOOD ADVISORY
FOR THE FOLLOWING MUNICIPALITIES...
IN PUERTO RICO
COROZAL...MOROVIS...NARANJITO AND VEGA ALTA
* UNTIL 1000 PM AST
* AT 759 PM AST...DOPPLER RADAR INDICATED NUMEROUS SHOWERS IN THE
ADVISORY AREA. THESE AREAS OF SHOWERS HAVE THE CAPABILITY OF
PRODUCING MODERATE TO LOCALLY HEAVY RAINFALL WHICH WILL LEAD TO
RAPID RISES ON SMALL STREAMS AND CREEKS...AS WELL AS MINOR FLOODING
ALONG ROADWAYS...THROUGH AT LEAST 10:00PM AST.
MOST FLOOD DEATHS OCCUR IN AUTOMOBILES. NEVER DRIVE YOUR VEHICLE INTO
AREAS WHERE THE WATER COVERS THE ROADWAY. FLOOD WATERS ARE USUALLY
DEEPER THAN THEY APPEAR. JUST ONE FOOT OF FLOWING WATER IS POWERFUL
ENOUGH TO SWEEP VEHICLES OFF THE ROAD. WHEN ENCOUNTERING FLOODED
ROADS MAKE THE SMART CHOICE...TURN AROUND...DONT DROWN.
&&
LAT...LON 1837 6630 1831 6625 1825 6636 1828 6638
1827 6640 1833 6645 1835 6639 1835 6638
1836 6637 1837 6632
$$
OMS
The largest period I could find without an El Nino was from 1958-1962. So it's not as if multiple years without an El Nino are unprecedented.
A steady rain all afternoon and evening here. Still drizzling. I'm worried about the Cibuco River overflowing.
You're welcome. :P
Enhanced Infrared (IR) Imagery (4 km Mercator)
i know its not hurricane season!!!! el nino or la nino hurricanes happen in both!!! and very often in both.... lets turn the attention to this late weeks possible mid atlantic snow storm!!!
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