Why the Stakes Are High with Hurricane Sandy

By now, most of you have heard the chatter surrounding Hurricane Sandy and her potential impacts in New England early next week. The wise and clever meteorologist will always preach caution when projecting confidence in a forecast period over 100 hours away, so I must preface this entry by saying that there is still a lot of changing variables and factors that can alter the outcome. That being said, special attention needs to be paid to this storm as the stakes will be higher than normal. It is quite likely that should the storm make landfall near our region, some communities will experience devastating conditions, the likes of which haven't been felt here in some 60 plus years.

I fear that some of the public might not take this storm as seriously since we just had a tropical system (Irene) last summer. Irene certainly took her toll in terms of devastation, but as far as tropical storms go, most of us got off lightly. However, this storm will be different than Irene, and different from most mid-latitude tropical storms that we sometimes see. And here is why.

1.) Strength/Duration- Typically, a tropical storm or hurricane that travels up the East Coast will quickly lose a lot of its tropical features the further North it goes. What that amounts to is a decrease in wind strength, lose of any eye wall features and a sharp cut off in the position of strong winds and heavy rainfall placement within the storm. Sandy won't be so quick to lose her tropical features. She will be aided by an abnormal feature currently setting up over the lower 48, as seen in the image below. The jet stream, upper level steering current, is about to become very tilted. Strong cold air diving south from Canada will result in a jet stream that will run from south to north by the weekend. Whats worse, this jet stream will set up just to the West of Sandy, who will be emerging from the Caribbean with a tremendous amount of energy.  Tropical systems exist outside of the jet stream and any steering currents, so this jet stream position will be two fold. It will capture Sandy and push her North but also infuse her with even more energy, allowing her to maintain and even gain strength.

2.)Abnormal blocking- In meteorology, blocking refers to a large pool of cold air way up in the atmosphere that acts as a blocking agent to normal atmospheric flow. We hear a lot about blocking in the winter, since it is a favorable pattern for nor'easter development. It just so happens that a strong block developed early this week, eliminating any escape route for Atlantic storms. It will also slow Sandy down tremendously, in a spot where tropical storms usually speed up. Remember how quickly Irene was over with? Take a look at the image above again and you might notice what looks like a "path" that is carved out right up the East Coast.  With a south to north upper level flow, an abundance of tropical moisture and strong blocking to the East, the triple threat has been set in place.

The terms like "perfect storm" and "storm of the century" have been used quite liberally in the past. But this atmospheric set up is the closest thing that meteorologists have seen to an actual perfect storm set up. As such, the negative impacts we can expect to feel will be greatly amplified, something I will address in a later post.

For now, a heightened vigilance is all that is needed. Specifics won't be reliable until we get closer to the weekend.