The extremely wet and windy Nor'easter that plowed across the northern tier of states has left moderate to major flooding in its wake over both the Midwest and Northeast. In the Northeast, the storm dropped more than five inches of rain in New Jersey, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, and moderate to major flooding is occurring in these states. Flooding was particularly severe in Rhode Island on the Pawtuxet River in Cranston, where the river crested a record six feet over flood stage, forcing evacuations. Major flooding was also occurring in New Jersey, where the Passaic River at Little Falls is cresting at five feet over flood stage.
In the Midwest, snow melt and heavy rains have swollen the Red River in North Dakota and Minnesota to near flood stage, and the river is expected to crest two feet above major flood stage by Sunday morning, and one foot above one of the permanent dikes on the river. In Fargo, ND, the Red River is expected to crest Saturday at 38 feet, three feet below the record of 41 feet set last year. Many rivers in Iowa are in flood and expected to crest above major flood stage on Thursday or Friday this week, including the Des Moines River in northern Iowa. In Des Moines, flooding on the Des Moines River is expected to be moderate, but a levee that failed in the floods of 1993 and 2008 is leaking, and residents of the area are evacuating, according to media reports.
Figure 1. Estimated precipitation for the seven day period ending at 8am EDT Monday March 15, 2010. Image credit: NOAA.
Tropical Cyclone Tomas roars through Fiji Islands
Tropical Cyclone Tomas roared through the eastern portion of the Fiji Islands as a major Category 3 storm with 130 mph winds yesterday. Tomas sideswiped the two largest islands in the chain, destroying 50 buildings, causing extensive power outages, and claiming one life. The cyclone made a direct hit on several of the smaller islands to the east of the main islands, and the extent of damage on these islands is unknown, but undoubtedly very heavy.
Tropical Cyclone Ului weakens, may threaten Australia
The first Category 5 tropical cyclone of the year, Tropical Cyclone Uliu, has weakened from its impressive peak as a Category 5 storm with 160 mph winds to a low-end Category 4 storm with 132 mph winds. Ului is over the open waters of the South Pacific, east of Australia, and is projected to significantly decay as the week progresses, due to high wind shear. Ului may be a threat to the Queensland coast of Australia by the end of the week, but should be at tropical storm strength by then.
Figure 2. Tropical Cyclone Ului (left) and Tropical Cyclone Tomas (right). Over the Solomon Islands, Tropical Cyclone Ului had maximum sustained winds of 130 knots (240 kilometers per hour, 150 miles per hour) and gusts up to 160 knots (300 km/hr, 180 mph). Over Fiji, Tropical Cyclone Tomas had maximum sustained winds of 115 knots (215 km/hr, 132 mph) and gusts up to 140 knots (260 km/hr, 160 mph). The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites captured both storms in multiple passes over the South Pacific on March 15, 2010, local time. The majority of the image is from the morning of March 15 (late March 14, UTC time) as seen by MODIS on the Terra satellite, with the right portion of the image having been acquired earliest. The wedge-shaped area right of center is from Aqua MODIS, and it was taken in the early afternoon of March 15 (local time). Image credit: NASA.
Portlight looks to build permanent shelters in Haiti
On February 26th, torrential rains brought more than five feet (1.5 m) of flood water into the streets in the coastal city of Les Cayes, Haiti, an area unscathed by the massive January 2010 earthquake. Eleven people were killed during this storm, with the rainy season still two months away. This deadly flood serves as a reminder that the people of Haiti are highly vulnerable to disastrous flooding during this year's rainy season. A vast number of the survivors are living in "tent" cities where most of the "tents" are really nothing more than bed sheets draped over ropes and sticks; the potential for a second humanitarian disaster is significant. With this in mind, Portlight.org has been exploring fast, inexpensive methods of providing solid, permanent, safe shelter for survivors of the earthquake. They have found a number of groups looking at using shipping containers for this purpose. Shipping containers are steel-reinforced boxes used for shipping goods overseas. Portlight's on-site coordinator in Haiti, Richard Lumarque, has identified an engineer that has come up with a number of designs for converting these containers into dormitories, offices, medical facilities and individual homes; his plan for a dormitory container is below. Portlight is looking to help with this effort; please visit the Portlight.org web site to learn more and to donate to this worthy cause.
Figure 3. A proposed design for a simple dormitory that can accommodate twelve people, built from a shipping container.
I'll have a new post on Wednesday or Thursday.
Jeff Masters
2010 NorEaster Flood in Manville, NJ
Small bridge in Haddonfield flooded at Cooper River along Kings Highway on 3/13/10
Lower Berkshire Valley Rd.
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Strong similarities there in terms of the overall profile. The only major difference in the northern hemisphere is the NE Pacific is colder this year, but that is actually more indicative of an active season in the SW Atlantic. At any rate, you can clearly see why 2005 is an analog year, based on that map alone.
Cape Verde yes, this and shear was a prohibiting factor in 2005. Irene and I believe Lee were the only CV storms that year (correct me if I'm wrong) Most of 2005s storms were homegrown and away from SAL. SAL will unlikely be a problem this year, as wet sand mean sand is more unlikely to be moved into the atmosphere compared to a below-average rainfall season in Africa.
Video on youtube
Edit: Just got the information on a German weather blog that this video actually is from February. Sorry.
Been reading the blog since '05 but joined finally a few months back. Really using this as a learning experience... You can usually distiguished fact from fiction because people usually give the links where they got the information. There have been a few in the past I noticed though who liked to doctor images before they would post them. I prefer links so I can see the information myself without wondering where the poster got it.
Still missing people from that fateful morning of 9-14-08. Either remains sunk to bottom of Galveston Bay or they remain in the swamps and brush in Chambers county
Tell me about it.. I was in Biloxi this past weekend... They are still cleaning up and deciding where to rebuild things post Katrina.
And the actual release
A Tad cloudy with some Breaks to full Sun.
ST. PATRICK'S DAY IN NEW ORLEANS
All things Green in and around New Orleans
Live from Parasol's: Celebrate all things green Wednesday, March 17
There is nothing like a New Orleans Hand Grenade!!!!LOL
A hand grenade is a strong alcoholic cocktail drink. It was first made at the 1984 Louisiana World Exposition. The "hand grenade" consists of 1 1/2 ounces of rum, gin, vodka, grain alcohol, and melon liquor served over crushed ice and garnished with mint.
The crew aboard the International Space Station conducted a change of command ceremony Wednesday as Expedition 22 comes to a close and two crew members prepare for an early Thursday return home.
In a brief ceremony at 8:45 a.m. EDT, Expedition 22 Commander Jeff Williams thanked the international ground teams and his fellow crewmates, Flight Engineers Maxim Suraev, Oleg Kotov, Soichi Noguchi, and T.J. Creamer, before handing over command of the station to Kotov, who will lead Expedition 23 when Williams and Suraev depart.
Afterwards, the crew wrapped up the day’s activities and headed off to bed for a 10-hour sleep period beginning at 10 a.m. to rest up for a busy night of departure work.
Williams and Suraev will bid their final farewells Wednesday at 11:40 p.m. as they climb aboard their Soyuz TMA-16 spacecraft and close the hatches. Undocking is expected to take place around 4 a.m. Thursday, leading to a 7:23 a.m. landing in the steppes of Kazakhstan.
With frigid weather and gusty winds predicted to greet Williams and Suraev at the landing site, Russian and NASA personnel are staying overnight in nearby Arkalyk to assure a swift recovery of the crew. Weather permitting, four additional helicopters will depart from Kustanai Thursday and refuel in Arkalyk en route to the landing site to assist with the recovery.
Same thing here in SE TX. Grants still coming in from FEMA for housing lost to Rita. Only now one of the cities around here are arguing that the housing had to be constructed and look a certain way to fit in with historic neighborhoods. Sigh, gotta love red tape. Then there are the projects that had reached or nearly reached completion after Rita that Ike laid waste to. Deja vu all over again.
amazing footage, truly catastrophic.
People on Bourbon St are hilarious to watch after they get a couple of those under their belt too!!! Problem is they are so dang tasty you don't realize how much you actually had!!
Cold Mid-Latitude Winter May have Implications on Hurricane Season
By Joseph D’Aleo, March 13, 2010 Link
I love the cop in the foreground directing traffic and people away from the slide...that's pretty funny; as if anyone would be running in the wrong direction with a million tons of hillside coming at you...
SSTs and TCHP are much above average in the Caribbean. The reason for the cooler SSTs in the GOMEX is because of the cold winter the south has had, and will likely (and already is) recover.
you didn't see the guy on a boogie board riding the slide?
:P
More the latter than the former. The gulf has its own attitude, and is a pretty isolated body of water. It is more affected by the weather above it than anything else (e.g. Air temperature, clouds, precipitation).
LOL...I like the woman who walks around around the corner, looks back and starts running
That is one thing that makes the gulf so dangerous during hurricane season. It is frequently an "x-factor".
Yep. And it will be hot enough and too soon. It's in the low 60's now in the NW corner and as usual if the wind comes off that water it's AC time. Already been there a couple a times this year. The gulf will be bath water as usual. But last year it was way hotter than this year. And we had no storms in the western 2/3rds anyway.
Yea, Gulf is a whole nudda ballgame and animal, It'll heat up in no time like there wasn't even a El Nino or cold winter. That's why in SE TX I don't worry about Atlantic or Carribbean storms because they are going to change once in the Gulf
Id say that the indications are for strengthening, but of course it will depend on how the eyewall fills in or doesnt fill in within the next 12 to 24 hours
ALL NOAA Floater Imagery
It was approximately 4 years ago that Innisfail,(just south of Cairns)had a Cat 4 make landfall, but I'd have to look back on the storm name & stat's for more accurate info.
We shall see. I have no doubt she will re-strengthen once the upwelling ceases to be a problem. Her overall structure has done nothing but improve over the last 48 hours, it's just that the heat energy to strengthen her and sustain deep convection isn't there. Once she gets that, it shouldn't take much to get her back on her feet.
I watch Atlantic and Caribbean storms only so I am aware of them. I don't get concerned personally until something shows a threat to cross over FL at full steam from the Atlantic, or shoot the gaps around Cuba. That said, if anything forms in the Gulf... my eyes are riveted on it right away.
Tropical Cyclone Ului
View All Tropical Activity
Public Advisory
remarks:
171500z position near 14.6s 158.0e.
Tropical cyclone (tc) 20p (ului), located approximately 730 nm east
of Cairns, Australia, has tracked south-southeastward at 04 knots
over the past six hours. After being quasistationary for nearly 36
hours ului has begun to accelerate with the strengthening of the
subtropical steering ridge to the south. The trough that had been
responsible for the weakened state of this ridge is positioned to
move downstream within the next 12 to 24 hours. With the trough
downstream the ridge will further strengthen and track the cyclone
towards the East Coast of Australia, of which the model guidance is
now in excellent agreement with. The initial intensity has decreased
to 100 knots in response weakened central convection, which is most
likely the consequence of upwelling of cooler sub-surface water.
Recently improved poleward venting should help to offset significant
decay of central convection and stabilize the intensity near 100
knots for the next day. The 0600z Dvorak intensity estimate from
pgtw indicates a 77 to 102 knot system. The system will come ashore
shortly after tau 72 and will dissipate over interior Queensland
near tau 120. The cyclone will slowly weaken prior to landfall due
to restricted poleward outflow and elevated vertical wind shear.
Maximum significant wave height at 171200z is 23 feet. Next warnings
at 180300z and 181500z. Refer to tropical cyclone 19p (tomas)
warnings (wtps32 pgtw) for twelve-hourly updates.//
Cyclone Larry hit just south of Cairns in the same season Monica occurred; 2005-2006 I believe
Ah...so the JTWC finally catches on to the upwelling...a whole day after the Australians did :) They initially blamed wind shear for Ului's weakening, and I still don't understand their forecast for higher wind shear prior to landfall. Oh well, time will tell.
lol sorry, actually that was quite a bit north of where Ului may end up. So maybe the person who originally asked was asking the last time the area near Mackay was hit?
Yes, that was my intent. I don't recall any storms hitting down in that area recently.
Storm Relative 1km Geostationary Visible Imagery
Time of Latest Image: 201003172130
Enhanced Infrared (IR) Imagery (4 km Mercator)
Time of Latest Image: 201003172200
But Im A "Gort" Fan as well.
Tropical Cyclone Ellie 08/09 season Cat 1.
Causing about AU$110 million ($70.7 million USD) in damages. In Ingham, between Cairns and Townsville, some 50 homes were flooded, with 32 people evacuated to emergency accommodation at a local high school.
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