While the two hurricanes affected the entire Atlantic coast, Connecticut suffered the most damage. For example, of the 180 lives that were lost, 77 were in Connecticut. Of the 680 million dollars in property damage, over 350 million dollars occurred in Connecticut. Over 200 dams in New England suffered partial to total failure. This is a photo of Winsted, virtually devastated by the flood.
We've been extremely fortunate in recent years with respect to hurricanes and tropical weather, but that doesn't mean we should let our guard down at all. The well-respected forecast team at Colorado State University stuck to its earlier seasonal hurricane forecasts yesterday, calling for 16 named storms, including nine hurricanes, with five of them major storms packing winds of more than 110 miles per hour.
The CSU team’s leaders, Phil Klotzbach and William Gray, predict that this season be similar to hurricane seasons in 1952, 1966, 2005, and 2008. The team points to a warm sea surface temperature and unusually low sea-level pressure in the tropical Atlantic among the reasons Florida could see a very active hurricane season.
They also point to Pacific Ocean conditions that are neutral between El Nino and La Nino. El Ninos is a warmer-than- usual pattern in the Pacific that can create winds that shear apart hurricanes before they form. La Nina — a cooler than usual pattern — and neutral conditions have no such effect.
For the remainder of the season, Klotzbach also recalculated probabilities for a major hurricane making landfall on the U.S. coast:
•A 70 percent chance that a major hurricane will make landfall on the United States coastline;
•A 46 percent chance for the East Coast, including Florida. The long-term average for the last century is 31 percent;
•A 45 percent chance for the Gulf Coast from the Florida Panhandle West to Brownsville. The full-season average for the last century is 30 percent.
Many people still remember Hurricane Gloria in September of 1985, but the combination of Connie and Diane 30 years earlier yielded rainfall totals close to 25 inches in some areas, resulting in unprecedented flooding. Nearly all of the major rivers in the lower Connecticut Valley exceeded flood stage. Some rivers rose more than 20 feet over their banks. Let's hope we never see that again.
For now, though, we continue to watch Tropical Storm Emily, which showed continued signs of disorganization and slowed to dump torrential rains on Hispaniola. Emily's forecast track still shows the storm will regroup and brush past South Florida, with the latest track a bit further east than had been feared Wednesday.
Paul
