How might this compare to the 2006 storm Q? It seems a bit late in the year for one to form.
The Medicane season is quite different from the Atlantic hurricane season. While the later is June 1 to December 1 with a peak in August/September the former is September 1 to March 1 with a peak in December/January (there is no official medicane season but that's how I've defined it based on the climatology). So we aren't even half way through the medicane season yet!
The reason the Medicane season is later than the atlantic hurricane season is due to several factors:
1) Medicanes don't care as much about SSTs, while Atlantic hurricanes gain their instability from warm SSTs medicanes gain their instability from cold uppers (as do some north atlantic storms like Ophelia from this year). So the reduction of SST over the winter is more than compensated by the reduction at higher levels.
2) Constant vorticity generation in the gulf of Genoa. Part of the issue with the atlantic during the autumn and winter is that there are no east africa waves to generate spin to get these storms started. For the med that is not an issue; the gulf of Genoa orographically spawns storms at a rate higher than anywhere else on the entire planet so the med is never short of vorticity during winter.
3) The essential presence of cold cutoff lows. While atlantic storms don't need cutoff lows it is essential for medicanes and they are actually somewhat more likely in early winter when the jet stream dives well to the south. North atlantic hurricanes (again for example Ophelia) behave similarly to medicanes in that they are generated in cold water from cutoff lows too.
I'll be adding more info like this to my new website over the coming weeks and months: https://medicane.wordpress.com/
Regarding strength of this storm, looks like it could be a strong one however its always difficult to say in advance. I'm really hoping that it reaches peak strength during the day (unlike trixie from last year) so we can get some beautiful imagery of it (unfortunately it seems just by bad luck most medicanes have reached their peak during the night).
Edited by user
14 November 2017 11:41:07
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Reason: Not specified
Twitter: @QuantumOverlord (general), @MedicaneWatch (medicane/TC stuff)
2023/2024 Snow days (approx 850hpa temp):
29/11 (-6), 30/11 (-6), 02/12 (-5), 03/12 (-5), 04/12 (-3), 16/01 (-3), 18/01 (-8), 08/02 (-5)
Total: 8 days with snow/sleet falling.
2022/2023 Snow days (approx 850hpa temp):
18/12 (-1), 06/03 (-6), 08/03 (-8), 09/03 (-6), 10/03 (-8), 11/03 (-5), 14/03 (-6)
Total: 7 days with snow/sleet falling.
2021/2022 Snow days (approx 850hpa temp):
26/11 (-5), 27/11 (-7), 28/11 (-6), 02/12 (-6), 06/01 (-5), 07/01 (-6), 06/02 (-5), 19/02 (-5), 24/02 (-7), 30/03 (-7), 31/03 (-8), 01/04 (-8)
Total: 12 days with snow/sleet falling.