Stir It Up

Hurricane season started today. Uh oh.

The Atlantic Basin got a little bit of a reprieve last year: only nine named storms and three hurricanes. And on top of that, the hurricanes were named "Bill", "Fred", and "Ida". I mean come on, did anyone REALLY feel threatened by that?

People way smarter than me are predicting much more activity in the coming months. Water temperatures are at record highs. On top of that, a weak El Nino is depriving the atmosphere of strong upper-level winds necessary for wind shear, which is really effective at ripping the heart out of tropical cyclones before they can get their juices really flowing. Add it all up, and NOAA is predicting up to 14 hurricanes, 7 Category 3 or higher.

All of that could translate to one of the more active seasons in history -- although hopefully nothing ever outdoes 2005, which spawned monster after monster in the Gulf of Mexico (Katrina, Rita, Wilma) en route to running out of names, forcing us to use the Greek alphabet to name storms 22-27.

And that's not even speaking of the BP oil spill off the coast of Louisiana (Day 43 and counting). Sure doesn't sound good, does it? Could the spill throw a monkey wrench into the 2010 hurricane season, or vice versa?

NOAA released a nice little write-up on the subject. There are a lot of variables and possible outcomes. The spill probably wouldn't have much effect on hurricane development. On the other hand, a hurricane could actually disperse the oil more quickly by chopping up the water with high winds and seas. Or it could drive the oil inland via storm surge, depending on the track of the storm.

The worst storm surge is typically found in the eastern eyewall. Think about it: if the storm is rotating counter-clockwise (as it always will in the northern hemisphere), then the eastern side of the circulation is where seawater would most forcefully be pushed onto shore. Thus, if a hurricane slammed Louisiana, bypassing the oil slick slightly to the west, the results could be disastrous for the Louisiana wetlands. On the other hand, if one were to track over the Florida panhandle, the oil could be pushed back into the Gulf.

It seems unlikely that this question will go unanswered for too long. But you never know: ironically, maybe a couple of good tropical cyclones is all the Gulf needs to more quickly rid itself of this disaster.

P.S. On a related note, as I was browsing aimlessly through Wikipedia earlier tonight, I found this picture of a Hurricane Hunter flying in the middle of Katrina's eye. Is that not the craziest thing you've ever seen?

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ADDENDUM: A new report released today estimates that the oil will invade the Atlantic coast of Florida "within weeks" and disperse through the Atlantic basin by the end of July. Helpful animation: