I was going to title the post “Me, Myself, and Irene”, but I got an overwhelming sense that I’ve already used that title. I don’t think I have, upon searching for it. I have, however, posted on Irene before. Last time, she went out to sea. They re-use the same names every 7 years, unless the storm causes a sufficient amount of damage or generates enough casualties, at which time they take it out of the rotation. 6 years ago at the end of this month was Katrina, and you can bet that you won’t be seeing that name attached to a hurricane again.
Meanwhile, the tropical season has had a large number of named systems, all of which have been exceptionally weak. In a lot of ways, it seems like a “cook the books” scenario, where the NHC is naming storms to 1) validate their prediction for the yearly total or 2) validate the predictions of some global warming models. Whatever the case, it’s a bit excessive, though only one or two of the storms didn’t pass the eye test, so I won’t protest too much.
As for this year’s Irene…
I see Irene has being a hurricane in a day and a half, right before it smashes into Hispaniola and is disemboweled. The models are shifting the track progressively north, so I think it will emerge as a minimal tropical storm and then slide just north of Cuba. Once it hits the Gulf Stream, all bets are off, particularly if it continues to slide north and picks up a larger stretch of it. I’d predict landfall in Georgia (and most of the models do), but it looks like only 6 hurricanes have done that since 1854, with only two in the 20th century (David in 1979 as the last). It’s a rare track since hurricanes tend to start to curve away near the coast, and it’s tough to curve into that concave shape. I’ll guess that it’s going to be more like Gaston in 2004, at least for the landfall and thereafter. Intensity is anywhere from non-existence to 130 mph, so I won’t venture a guess yet. Those islands can really gut a storm.
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