WxWatcher007

This. "Low end" C4 is probably the best we can do, and everything would have to align to create the conditions to blunt rapid weakening and/or extratropical transition. There's so much that would factor into whether potential is maximized. But we don't need the highest end cane to have high end impacts. As I see it, a large and inertially stable C4/C5 hurricane, taking 1) the 1938 track that blasts to Montreal, 2) a hook left to bring the RFQ into NY Harbor, or 3) an eastward slide that brings the RFQ from Groton to Boston are the nightmare scenarios. The other, which we don't talk about but I think is increasingly on the table given CC, is a scenario where a tropical entity is drawn up into the region using the canonical synoptic setup to bring it here, but we see a collapse of the steering flow as it arrives and a biblical rainfall results. It has happened in the recent past in the south (Imelda, Florence as examples) but I think Henri, for all its failure to deliver wind, was proof of concept in New England.

I hadn’t seen the Icon, but Euro AI has been pretty keen on this one. GFS seems to be the odd model out right now.

And for the uninitiated

I like seeing the GDM (Google Deep Mind) ensembles increasingly bullish on some type of development. I'm intrigued. 3/10 for now.

I have no doubt that if we saw a repeat of 1938 in terms of track and intensity, people would take it seriously. Keep in mind, to get a major here you probably need it to be a high end 3 or more likely, Cat 4 off the NC coast (as 1938 was) and that alone would have people in a panic. It'd be the most hyped storm in history, with good reason. A bona fide major would be catastrophic depending on the track, even absent C3 sustained winds inland (which would be unlikely unless this is rocketing). Now that said, on this board? I already know how the run up would be. The first time the Euro kicks it at 144 with an over-zealous trough "she gone" would be the most popular phrase on the board. Followed by days and days of downplaying. Then complaining over the final track, which will shift 50 miles in the last 12 hours. Haven't seen a C5 yet, but I've seen a couple 4s, it's incredible. In Helene, I regret not doing a U-Turn on the highway to get a photo but I saw a massive pine snapped at the base well inland. In Laura, the damage was staggering. Fiona--it wasn't officially a hurricane when it hit Nova Scotia but I was one of the first on the ground after it passed and produced that 97kt gust in Arisaig. The damage was incredible all the way back to New Brunswick. But folks should know that even lower end tropical can and will do big time damage. The October Cape Cod crusher a few years ago (eventually Wanda) did C1 damage through the region and it was big time. I'm not as bearish as I was a few weeks ago. Subtropics aren't as bad thermodynamically as they could be. But the wind shear and dry air with more frequent troughs later in the season will be an issue. The window is narrow, but probably the place where we're most likely to see activity. Doubt anything meaningful comes out of the MDR this year.

I can already tell you that people will meh a hurricane all the way until landfall. And then complain they didn’t get the eyewall.

Euro AI and its ensemble have been intriguing, and other guidance has been showing a signal for homebrew. The NHC hasn’t tagged it yet, but the Gulf/SE coast are worth watching in about a week.

It’s on the table. Euro AI has been leading the way but the other ensembles have a signal for something that pops off what’s likely a stalled front in the Gulf. Might get pulled up the coast, or if a trough isn’t there, steered west in the Gulf.

Well if you like outages don’t worry. A bona fide hurricane up here would collapse the grid.

Nammy is hellacious

Eventually it will. We need some all time all time out here.

You need something to pop off the SE coast from a stalled front.

How could I forget ‘55! No doubt. I just thought their average highs would be much lower. Of course Denver isn’t feeling like South Beach on July 10…That would be rough lol though I wonder if they’d take that over wildfire risk.

Looking at that heatwave I happened to look at the normals out there this time of year. Salt Lake City averages 93° and Denver 90° on July 10. That’s as warm as Miami (90°)!

Not surprised they took the numbers down. You can already see how hostile things are out there as a whole and with an intensifying Nino things aren't likely to change. That said, as we get closer to the climatological peak there will be windows that open, probably way out in the subtropics, closer to the U.S. in the central/northern Gulf and SE coast where a front gets hung up, or later in the peak season where CAG season opens up again in the NW Caribbean and Gulf. Other than that it may be historically hostile in the tropical Atlantic even though the peak.

July 4 may have been the peak of severe season here. Let’s get two tropical systems to pour on us like 1954 so we can get moved from moderate drought to abnormally dry.

Basically what I’ve told my wife for 20 years.

Yeah, just bad QC imo. Not great but it happens. The first time I saw this widespread foolishness was Helene. How people can hold the government being totally incompetent and capable of literally changing the atmosphere at a massive scale simultaneously is mind numbing.

And let me just add lol. I'm not trying to be on some high horse denouncing people--mets or hobbyists--who try to be a real value add to the public discourse. I think the information sharing landscape has allowed for different perspectives to break through and advance the science by challenging our thinking on what's possible and why in wx. I'm biased, but I think many chasers add value by being in the dangerous places and collecting data and video that aids in our understanding of extreme wx and the issuance of warnings. But as we know...many are just trying to gain money and clout. God bless 'em, it's America, but the goal should always be building trust with the public and helping people understand science/context/impact.

I certainly agree that the changes we're seeing in how information gets communicated is starting to have a cumulative effect, and while I think most probably still understand what's over the top, when you have so much bad, misinterpreted, misleading information combined with a growing reliance on short form video rather than reading and critical thinking, we're going the wrong way. I think you can see it in how wildly popular some of the YouTubers in particular have become and how some elements of MSM seem to be trying to adopt similar styles even if it isn't going full on hype in the way we see online. I think that's a larger conversation though about how media has become less of a public trust focused on truth and analysis and more a place for entertainment and opinion that generates engagement and profit. There's always been an aspect of "if it bleeds it leads" but sometimes you watch the nightly news for example and they're leading off talking about a severe weather outbreak which, while bad, might completely leave out the context that severe weather outbreaks have happened for millennia because the atmosphere at its very core seeks balance. Pick your wx topic. It may be newsworthy in its own right because people are being impacted, but if you're leaving out all of the context, it does the general public a disservice. Another great example--and my hobbyhorse since I care about it more than any other type of wx--is tropical. You can bank on every active year truly outrageous bad analysis and hype. Whether it's people sharing 10 day operational model doom runs under the guise of "making sure people are prepared", or wanting to be the first to call for RI of a tropical wave because they rip and read a HAFS run before a LLC has even been identified, or probably the worst...taking a string of active seasons and/or a high end hurricane and declaring that the Atlantic is in a new era of hyperactivity. That definitely has a negative impact IMO on how the public views and responds to emergency managers who often times are community members just trying to do their best. I worry that the current information sharing landscape and the decline in reading and critical thinking is going to prove disastrous long term, not just in the wx space.

Thinking back to the conversation earlier today I came across this. A worthwhile read https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/08/reading-crisis-postliterate-age/687618/?gift=URojiRC-naOWGBfsE7oNmha0OJUXq9hYgtDbh92KSCg

I don’t think most people realize how dangerous this is at a societal level.

Yeah I mean that’s who quality controlled that! Indeed it does. A whole can of worms that’s probably human nature pushed to the extreme by proliferation of social media and algorithms. Only bound to get worse, unfortunately, and many of us are guilty of it as we rocket through the digital age.

I'm sorry, but some of this sounds like hyperbole of the hyperbole. What serious person is out there saying that a 90 degree day in New England is dangerous and requires people staying inside? Everybody knows the information environment is crap on balance. Even the general public to a large degree gets that. A met on local tv saying a heat dome is going to give us highs of 95 with a HI of 105 so take precautions otherwise it can be dangerous is very different from some kid on YouTube saying the heat dome is going to kill everybody. Yeah, they get clicks, but I don't encounter a lot of people in normal life who are cowering in a corner because of something they heard from a random online. In the face of a lot of bad information and hype out there, a lot of professionals and serious hobbyists have tried to counter that with using more probabilistic forecasting and communication, contextualizing how weather is not climate, and explaining how the science is the same even when terminology changes. To be clear--I believe the information environment is profoundly worse on balance than it was 30 years ago. There is too much hype, too many bad actors cashing in on quackery, and too little nuance introduced whenever we do have high end events (not every hurricane or major flood is directly tied to climate change, not every temperature drop below zero/above 100 is historic, etc) but I don't think it's fundamentally changed how most people make decisions, especially in advance of/during high end events. Not yet at least.

Not this year. Atlantic is closed.