John Homenuk

Rain, cold and even snow possible this weekend

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There, we used the “S word” in one of our posts for the first time this season. An energetic mid and upper level disturbance will shift from Central Canada through the Northeast United States late this week into the early part of this weekend, helping to develop a coastal storm. In addition to the coastal storm will come a strong cold front, and a cold Canadian airmass which will drop temperatures into the 30’s and 40’s at times after its passage. With models hinting at the development of multiple surface lows off the coast, the potential exists for not only rain and wind — but some snow in the higher elevations and the first flakes for others.

But the setup remains extremely complicated. The source region of the disturbance means forecast models are already working with a somewhat limited dataset. And, as is often the case with storms in our area, the mid level disturbances will be involved in fragile interactions, all of which will have a major impact on exactly how the storm develops. Confidence, as a result of these small nuances and features, remains very low.

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John Homenuk

Coastal storm lingers, improving weekend

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As meteorologists, you sometimes just have to toss your hands up and admit defeat. And with this weeks Nor’Easter, we’re doing just that. The storm came in much more intense, much more organized, and much more impactful than we forecasted or anticipated it to be. And while our area saw periods of heavy rain and wind from the storm, the system itself was quite dynamic.  Similar to winter Nor’Easters both aloft and at the surface, the storm featured a deepening surface low and a dynamically impressive mid level trough.

Enhanced lift from the developing surface low, which actually retrograded westward from the Atlantic toward Long Island last night, moved over New England and New York City overnight Wednesday into Thursday morning. The result was heavy rain, and more noticeably, strong gusty winds mixing down to the surface. The dynamic system featured strong winds just above the surface — and so heavy rain brought these down. Gusts over 50 miles per hour were common throughout New England and Long Island.

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John Homenuk

Coastal storm update: More heavy rain, wind tonight

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A coastal storm, developing as a result of a powerful mid and upper level system, developed today from the Delaware Coast to a position off the coast of the Mid-Atlantic states. Heavy rain moved through much of the area as a result of an inverted trough, and shifted from north to south throughout the day as the surface low moved more seaward. Since then, precipitation has become much more showery in nature — absent are the areas of heavy rain and thunderstorms. Northeasterly winds have increased in intensity along the coast.

Through the evening, the surface low off the coast is expected to strengthen slightly as the mid and upper level systems move south of Long Island. In a form more typical to winter-time systems, the surface low may actually hook back westward later tonight. While the storm itself isn’t necessarily strong in regards to its central pressure, the gradient between the developing surface low and the higher pressures around it will aid in the development of strengthening surface winds, especially along the coast.

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John Homenuk

The cost of a decades-worth of hurricanes

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It isn’t very often than something as immense as 10 years worth of hurricane’s damages can be visualized. But our friends at the Univeristy of North Carolina have done just that with their latest infographic. More than $310 Billion in damages have been caused by landfalling hurricanes in the United States during the past decade, with notable names such as Katrina, Wilma, and in our area — Sandy. Despite all of those names, many major coastal cities have escaped major damage since the early 2000’s. Hurricane Arthur, which made landfall this summer, was the strongest to make landfall since Ike in 2008. We haven’t seen a Major Hurricane make landfall since Wilma in 2005.

Adam Levenson, Community Manager for the UNC School of Government’s online masters of public administration program, said the research and infographic was a team effort. “Both faculty and staff at the School of Government were involved with the ideation, research, and editing processes”, Adam said. “The graphic itself was designed by ObizMedia. Our MPA program trains many students each year, most of whom go on to serve in local government. We had examined disasters from the local level in the past but wanted to see what insight investigating disasters on the macro level would provide.”

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