BajaNomad - 2008 Eastern Pacific Hurricane Forecast

2008 Eastern Pacific Hurricane Forecast

rob - 5-14-2008 at 04:39 PM

Every year about this time I am irritated by the timely issuance of the Atlantic hurricane forecast, and lack of same for the Eastern Pacific.

I have been scanning Google but the hits are zero (except for Accuweather, which is so slow in loading that the season will be over by the time it does - and I have yet to see what the page says).

Are we not equal? Do we not bleed? Any savants out there with suggestions of where to look?

comitan - 5-14-2008 at 04:46 PM

Do you really believe that someone can predict the number and intensity. :lol:

Roberto - 5-14-2008 at 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by comitan
Do you really believe that someone can predict the number and intensity. :lol:

Sure. Al Gore has for the next few years. Haven't you been paying attention?

Forecasting Hurricanes

bonanza bucko - 5-14-2008 at 05:08 PM

I'm a pilot and I use the WX forecast every day. It is only reliable about 8-12 hours in advance....sometimes not even that good. After that it is a lot of what ifs and guesses. The people making the forecasts do the best they can but, so far, we don't have a computer fast enough to even model the WX in real time.

If I take off on a long trip I want to see not only the forecasts but the wing, pressure, temperature and humidity (dewpoint) numbers that produced them....I make my own forecast.

If you pay attention you can do a better job of forecasting your own weather locally than the National Weather Service or any of the private providers can because they focus on wide area forecasts and can't pay attention to local stuff. A little reading and watching of the forecasts locally will make you as good or better than the dudes who get paid to read the WX on TV.

For sure the "Global Warming" drum thumpers do not have even the slightest idea about what is gonna happen next. They are the people who are telling us that man is now causing the kind of global warming that melted the glaciers that dug the Great Lakes......or the global warming, and subsequent cooling, that has happened naturally about a million times in the past. Even if the earth is now warming.....and there is NO evidence of that....there is even less evidence that man is powerful enough to have caused it. The only people who fall for that stuff are politicians looking for an issue to scare people, fraidycats or "scientists" looking for a gummint grant.

Osprey - 5-14-2008 at 05:31 PM

Bucko, thanks for turning up the numbers on common sense pilots >>> there's you and Cap and some other good guys who use English instead of pilotspeak like Capt. Overweight.

fulano - 5-14-2008 at 05:55 PM

Quote:

If I take off on a long trip I want to see not only the forecasts but the wing, pressure, temperature and humidity (dewpoint) numbers that produced them....I make my own forecast.

If you pay attention you can do a better job of forecasting your own weather locally than the National Weather Service or any of the private providers can because they focus on wide area forecasts and can't pay attention to local stuff.

1. How do you get around detrmining if you need to file an IFR flight plan with an alternate using your own forecast weather?

2. Why do you have to forecast "your own weather locally" when you can just look out the window? ..and how useful is a local forecast when you "take off on a long trip"?

3. Tell us how you determine the location, direction and speed of a squall line from looking at "wing[d], pressure, temperature and humidity (dewpoint) numbers."

4. I wasn't aware hurricanes were local weather phenomena.

stanburn - 5-14-2008 at 07:30 PM

Go to this website: http://smn.cna.gob.mx/ then click on ciclones on the top menu bar. The Mexican Weather Service (SMN) feels it will be a normal year.

Stan

Cypress - 5-14-2008 at 07:37 PM

They can't even tell for sure where a hurricane's gonna hit even when it's underway. :?:

And the forecasters are predicting 'em months in advance. :lol:

rob - 5-14-2008 at 07:42 PM

¡Gracias Stanburn! You have given me los goodes.

True (Cypress, Comitan), the seasonal prognostico for hurricanes may be a long shot (especially, it seems in the Eastern Pacific) - but I am wondering whether to buy a new generator, and some hint of the horror ahead is always useful when parting with money.

CONAGUA (CNA) Prognostico 2008 for Eastern Pacific

rob - 5-14-2008 at 07:52 PM

Conagua says that based on similar past years, we can expect 15 tropical systems (ciclones, with a standard deviation of 2), 7 of which could reach tropical storms, 5 moderate hurricanes, and 3 intense hurricanes.

For those who (wisely) mistrust my spanish, original text below.

Thanks to all.

"Realizando el promedio de las temporadas análogas se observa que la actividad de la temporada 2008,
en el Pacífico Nororiental, será cerca de la situación normal de 1970 a 2007, con una “estimación
promedio de 15 ciclones con nombre con una desviación estándar de 2”. De los 15 sistemas
tropicales, 7 podrían alcanzar la intensidad de tormenta tropical, 5 huracanes moderados y 3 huracanes
intensos"

East Pac

tehag - 5-14-2008 at 09:10 PM

http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/

Not very far out in time with predictions but very good when anything is developing.

ckiefer - 5-14-2008 at 09:12 PM

Wet your finger and stick it out the window.....

Pay not attention to me, working on 10 more posts.....

pappy - 5-15-2008 at 09:04 AM

today the weather channel started posting facts for east pacific hurricane season.(starts today through november) all i can say is that last years' total was well below average, with no real forcast-as of yet- for what might happen this season...

Taco de Baja - 5-15-2008 at 09:25 AM

All they know for sure is what they will be called....Until the name change again. :rolleyes:

Quote:

East Pacific Tropical Weather Outlook

000
ABPZ20 KNHC 151351
TWOEP
TROPICAL WEATHER OUTLOOK...CORRECTED
NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL
500 AM PDT THU MAY 15 2008

CORRECTED NAMES MARIE AND YOLANDA

FOR THE EASTERN NORTH PACIFIC...EAST OF 140 DEGREES WEST LONGITUDE..

THE LIST OF NAMES FOR 2008 IS AS FOLLOWS:

-------------------------------------------------------------
ALMA
BORIS
CRISTINA
DOUGLAS
ELIDA
FAUSTO
GENEVIEVE
HERNAN
ISELLE
JULIO
KARINA
LOWELL
MARIE
NORBERT
ODILE
POLO
RACHEL
SIMON
TRUDY
VANCE
WINNIE
XAVIER
YOLANDA
ZEKE

...TROPICAL STORM FORMATION IS NOT EXPECTED DURING THE NEXT 48 HOURS...

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATWOEP+shtml/151351.shtml

bajajazz - 5-15-2008 at 11:09 AM

The contempt some posters show for truly professional meteorologists reminds me of an event that preceded the disastrous hurricane early in the 20th Century that devastated Galveston, Texas.

Galveston's resident weather "expert" was warned by Cubans that a monster storm was on the way but since Cubans were colored people, what the hell did they know?

The fact that Cubans had a long history of dealing with hurricanes originating in the Atlantic, the Carribean and the Gulf of Mexico, and had acquired a lot of expertise in hurricane predictions and behavior over the centuries, was completely discounted by Galveston's gringo "weatherman."

When the storm that the Cubans had accurately predicted hit, Galveston was destroyed and six thousand people died. Moral: we ignore the informed opinions of genuine experts at our own peril.

The really bad news? We'll do it again.

comitan - 5-15-2008 at 12:12 PM

No matter what the prediction, buy the generator fill with oil but not gas, and keep fresh gas on hand when one hits.

Cypress - 5-15-2008 at 01:03 PM

comitan, That's some very good advice.