Time For A Deeper Dive Into Two Tropical Storm Threats

This map from the Weather Channel depicts insane amunts of rain
from Cyclone Mekunu in Oman and Yemen. In an area that gets
normally gets roughly five inches of year, up to a foot and a half
could come down in just a couple days. 

There are two odd threats looming in the tropical storm department:

A powerful storm is threatening to bring disaster upon Oman and Yemen this week, and a messy tropical system threatens flooding in the southeastern United States early next week.

Let's go overseas first, where the bigger of the two problems is looming.

CYCLONE MEKUNU

As of last night, Cyclone Mekunu was a borderline Category 1/Category 2 hurricane. (They're called cyclones where this one is, but a hurricane and a cyclone are the same thing.) Sustained winds are in the dangerous 90 to 95 mph range.

Mekong could easily end up becoming the strongest tropical cyclone on record to hit the Arabian Peninsula when it makes landfall near the Yemen-Oman border, says the India Meteorological Department.

According to Bob Henson in the Category 6 weather blog, Mekunu is worrying for two principal reasons: It's going to hit land at a nearly perpendicular angle, which would increase the winds, waves and storm surge in Oman.

It's also likely hitting near a populated area: The city of Salalah, Oman, population about 340,000, can expect a nasty storm surge and major flood.

The normally arid area where Mekunu is expected to hit will probably get eight to 16 inches of rain, with more in the nearby mountains. This in an area that normally gets just roughly five inches of rain per year. You can imagine, then, how destructive the floods will be with a storm that brings two year's worth of rain in a day or two.

This will be a major, deadly disaster, folks.

WANNABE TROPICAL STORM ALBERTO

A big area of the Southeast can expect flooding rains from a
tropical system to form in the Gulf of Mexico in the coming days
Areas in red and oranage at this point look to be at most risk.

It looks almost certain now that some sort of tropical system will affect the eastern or central Gulf Coast of the United States in the coming days.

What exactly that will be is still open to question, but dangerous flooding is becoming an increasing risk.

That weather disturbance that was near Belize the other day has moved north to near the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico and will emerge into the Gulf of Mexico in the next day or two.

Normally, this time of year, upper level winds are too strong in the Gulf of Mexico to support a tropical system.

These upper level winds rip apart thunderstorms that would form into a tropical storm, so they don't happen. Over the next few days, those upper level winds over the Gulf aren't all that strong, so this thing has the potential to develop.

It'll probably form into a tropical or subtropical depression in the coming days. (A subtropical system has characteristics of both a tropical storm and a regular old storm system.) There's a chance this storm could become strong enough to be declared a tropical storm, with sustained winds of 39 mph.

If it achieves tropical storm status, it will be named Alberto.

Whether or not this thing becomes a tropical storm, it will bring boatloads of moisture into the southeastern United States, so flooding is a real concern in that part of the country. It doesn't help that parts of the area that are in for a soaking from Wannabe Alberto are already quite wet from previous rains, so this could be a real troublemaker.

Wannabe Alberto will never become one of those nice pinwheel shaped tropical systems or hurricanes that you often see in satellite photos. It'll be a messy mass of clouds and downpours that will slowly invade the Southeast.

The Atlantic tropical storm season officially begins on June 1, so this might form before then. But tropical systems sometimes form before the "official" start of the hurricane season. Just because this is early doesn't necessarily mean the overall hurricane season will be especially nasty, like last year.

It's too soon to tell how bad the upcoming hurricane season will be, but here's one hopeful sign: Water temperatures in the area of the Atlantic where the most powerful hurricanes tend to form in August and September are cooler than average. If this state of affairs continues, that could cut down on hurricanes since these things need warm water to thrive. And the warmer the better, as far as hurricanes are concerned.

Then again, the National Hurricane Center today issued a forecast calling for a near normal to busier than normal hurricane season. We shall see!

Deja Vu All Over Again: Another Cyclone in Arabian Sea Threatens Yemen

Cyclone Chapala last week, left, and Cyclone Megh, now, right
seem like identical twins in the Arabian Sea.  

Last week, we talked about rare Cyclone Chapala, which became the first tropical storm of hurricane strength to strike the coast of Yemen.

As expected, Chapala caused a huge disaster, mostly through flooding. Yemen is normally arid, and Chapala dropped the same amount of rain in a couple days as normally falls there over several years.

Another cyclone in Arabian Sea, named Megh has developed, believe it or not, And it's threatening Yemen, This is EXTREMELY weird.

You do get the occasional cyclone (hurricanes as we call them in the good ole US of A) in the Arabian Sea, but not often. And they tend not to threaten to make landfall with any degree of huge strength.

But this year is different. This new cyclone, named Megh, if it indeed makes it to Yemen, might not be a full strength hurricane, but it will cause havoc by bringing lots more rain to a desert region already strangely saturated by the previous Cyclone Chapala.

About 50,000 people were displaced by Chapala in Yemen, and another 18,000 on the offshore island of Socotra, says Al Jazeera. 

Socotra was being battered again Sunday by this new Cyclone Megh as it travels towards Yemen, so things will only get worse.

Chapala and Megh were encouraged to develop by record high water temperatures in the Arabian Sea. Tropical cyclones are more likely to thrive the warmer the water gets.

A number of other factors are probably also contributing to the twin Arabian Sea cyclones, including global weather pattern called the Madden Julian Oscillation, which is an area of moisture and instability that often slowly circles the equatorial globe. When the MJO is in certain locations, it can encourage tropical storm development.

My guess is global warming contributed, but is not the only reason for the high Arabian Sea temperatures that contributed to the double cyclone disaster. Plus, there was just some bad luck involving weather conditions that favored tropical storm development.

As is the usual case, global warming could well be making what would have been a bad situation in Yemen worse.

Rare Hurricane Set To Hit Yemen, As If That Region Needs More Trouble

Hurricane Chapala now
menacing Yemen.  

A rare hurricane in the Arabian Sea became the strongest on record there, and the hurricane - named Chapala - has its sights set on Yemen.

You don't want a strong hurricane to hit any country. But you really don't want it to hit Yemen. War, a breakdown in government, violence, severe food shortages and other travails are now endemic in Yemen.  

A hurricane isn't going to help matters.  

On Friday, top winds reached 155 mph, making it a high end Category 4 storm, the second strongest anyone has seen in the Arabian sea.

Hurricanes don't happen all that often there. The sea is relatively small, surrounding desert lands entrain dry air to choke off impending systems, and strong upper level winds more often than not rip apart would-be hurricanes in the Arabian Sea.

This time, those strong upper level winds aren't present. Worse, water temperatures in the Arabian Sea are highest on record for this time of year. The higher the water temperature, the more likely a hurricane will grow stronger.

That's what happened last week with Hurricane Patricia off the coast of Mexico, which became the strongest hurricane on record in the Western Hemisphere due to record warm ocean temperatures beneath that storm.

If there is a plus side to this storm, it's that it will probably weaken somewhat by the time it reaches Yemen. Also, much like Patricia, and  to a certain extent devastating Hurricane Joaquin in the Bahamas earlier this autumn, Hurricane Chapala doesn't really cover that big an area.

On Friday, Hurricane Chapala's width wouldn't even quite cover the distance between New York City and Buffalo, New York.

Even better, the hurricane is forecast to hit a lightly populated section of Yemen. That's in good measure what saved Mexico from Hurricane Pauline. The small hurricane threaded the needle between two large cities and hit a lightly populated spot, which definitely helped minimize casualties.

Still, Yemen has never been hit by a hurricane, and tremendous amounts of rain are forecast to hit parts of this normally arid desert country. Essentially they'll have about eight years worth of rain in a couple days.

Many people in Yemen live in areas prone to flooding from even a paltry thunderstorm. So this storm could really, REALLY become dangerous.

As if people in Yemen didn't have enough danger in their lives already.

Videos: Summer Storms Are Scary! Watch These For Proof

Aftermath of August 2 Traverse City, Michigan
storm. Video of it is below. Add caption

A few videos I came across this week show how scary heavy rain and severe storms can get in a big hurry.

We go to Yemen, Italy and Michigan to show what a summer storm can do in just a few minutes.

The first one shows serious flooding in Yemen recently, and a young boy got caught in it.

As he was being swept away, the video will show what happened next. Spoiler: It's scary, but ends well.



Next, we go to Italy, for this flash flood that hit in the past week.  The images in the first half of the video are by far the most interesting:



Finally we go to Traverse City, Michigan on August 2, where an incredible storm caused widespread damage in the northern part of that state.

Here, the storm goes on and on, dismantling the trees in a forested neighborhood in Traverse City. It's a wonder the guy and his house weren't completely smushed. By the way, foul language alert in the video, but you'll understand why: