Fay intensifies over land

[phantom power]

Tropical Storm Fay (AKA "The Joker") is pulling a trick that may be unprecedented--significantly intensifying over land, developing a full eyewall. The radar and satellite images of Fay this afternoon (Figures 1 and 2) show a much better-organized storm than the Fay that made landfall this morning. Fay now has a symmetric appearance with a full eyewall, and the winds near the center were sustained at 60 mph this afternoon at Lake Okeechobee. These winds are higher than anything measured at landfall this morning. Remarkably, the pressure has fallen over 10 mb since landfall, and I can't ever recall seeing such a large pressure fall while a storm was over land. Hurricane Andrew of 1992 crossed South Florida and did not weaken significantly, but "The Joker" has significantly intensified. It does happen sometimes that the increased friction over land can briefly act to intensify a hurricane vortex, but this effect is short-lived, once the storm is cut off from its oceanic moisture source. To have a storm intensify over land and maintain that increased intensity while over land for 12 hours is hard to explain. The only thing I can think is that recent rains in Florida have formed large areas of standing water that the storm is feeding off of. Fay is also probably pulling moisture from Lake Okeechobee. Anyone want to write a Ph.D. thesis on this case? Wow.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1033&tstamp=200808

[mnhtnbb]

1. Uh-oh.

[SheilaT]

2. The weather gods

are searching for me.

I just moved from Kansas to New Mexico, and Sunday there were violent thunderstorms and tornadoes here in NM. I thought I'd left them behind in Kansas. But the tornado gods apparently located me (although it did take them three weeks), and now the hurricane gods are looking for me. I think I'm, far enough inland that they can't reach me, but shortly after I got here the remnants of Edouard reached southwestern NM, so they were trying.

[phantom power]

3. It is possible that...

you are the storm god:

And as he drove on, the rainclouds dragged down the sky after him, for, though he did not know it, Rob McKeena was a Rain God. All he knew was that his working days were miserable and he had a succession of lousy holidays. All the clouds knew was that they loved him and wanted to be near him, to cherish him, and to water him.
--Douglas Adams

http://www.knowprose.com/node/12081