Ida batters resort, strengthens into hurricane
Forecasters say Nicaragua, Honduras may face flash floods, mudslides
NBC News and news services
updated 6:53 a.m. CT, Thurs., Nov . 5, 2009
MANAGUA, Nicaragua - Ida strengthened into Category 1 hurricane as it approached the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua Thursday and was set to make landfall later in the day, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
Heavy rains dumped on Nicaragua's eastern coast. Ida also uprooted trees, knocked down power lines and forced the evacuation of 300 people from the popular resort of Corn Island.
Much of the island had lost its phone service, said Lt. Col. Reinaldo Carrion, the civil defense chief in Bluefields, the city nearest to the island.
At 7 a.m. local time, the center of Hurricane Ida was located about 60 miles north-northeast of Bluefields and about 85 miles south of Puerto Cabezas in Nicaragua.
The hurricane was moving toward the northwest at close to 7 mph and, after making landfall, will move across eastern Nicaragua and Honduras during the next couple of days, the center said.
The hurricane center warned of possible life-threatening flash flood and mudslides, saying storm could dump 15 to 20 inches of rain over eastern Nicaragua.
Ton Bos, owner of the Paraiso Beach Hotel on Corn Island, told the Associated Press on Wednesday that winds and rain were heavy, but he had seen worse. "There is a lot of rain, a lot of wind and some trees are coming down, but it's not a catastrophe," Bos said by cell phone. "I've been here four years and it's been worse than this."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33620554/ns/weather/
Hurricane Ida set to make landfall
M. Ressler, Lead Meteorologist, The Weather Channel
Nov. 5, 2009 7:30 am ET
Now Hurricane Ida continues to strengthen as it approaches the Nicaraguan coast. As of 7:00 AM EST, Hurricane Ida was located about 60 miles north-northeast of Bluefields, Nicaragua with top winds of 75 mph. The current movement is off to the northwest around 7 mph.
Hurricane warning is in effect for the east coast of Nicaragua from Bluefields to Puerto Cabezas and then a hurricane watch extends northward to the Honduras border.
Tropical storm warnings remain in effect for portions of the coast of Nicaragua not covered by the hurricane warning.
The system is expected to stay in weak steering environment the next few days with a slow movement off to the northwest and north in the general direction of Nicaragua, next Honduras and then the Yucatan Channel.
Ida will weaken considerably over land to a tropical depression by Friday before re-emerging into the Caribbean Sea north of Honduras early Saturday.
Heavy rain will be a huge threat and will impact Nicaragua and Honduras. The heaviest amounts of 15 to 20 inches, with locally 25 inches are possible in eastern portions of Honduras and Nicaragua.
Life-threatening flooding and mudslides will be likely as a result. Be ready and take precautions if you live in a low lying area or flood plain.
On average, about one tropical storm develops every two years during the month of November and every three years a hurricane develops. The southwest Caribbean is the most favored location for this to occur.
The last season with a named storm in November was 2008 when Paloma developed and impacted the Cayman Islands and Cuba.
2009 Atlantic Basin Hurricane Season Summary
2009 will go into the record books as a very uneventful hurricane season, to this point anyway. The question "why has it been so quiet" always arises as a season like this one comes to an end, especially after a series of very active years. Hindsight is sometimes 20/20 so I will give my hindsight "opinion" of what happened. But the prediction of the occurrence of the following features is not at all easy to forecast or extrapolate before it happens! There are two primary reasons for the quiet season in my opinion;
1) The mid-latitude westerly winds were much farther south than normal and this southward displacement caused three upper level wind features across the Gulf Caribbean and Atlantic to also be shifted south. The diagram below shows the three upper level circulation features, only one is readily conducive to tropical cyclone formation (the Subequatorial Ridge) and it was displaced south of the typical genesis area and where tropical waves normally track.
The TUTT caused shear, and the Subtropical Ridge, although typically a region of light wind shear, caused sinking air. Neither of these circulations typically favors tropical cyclone formation, and they did not in 2009.
2) El Nino unfolded and became more prominent through summer and fall. The basic result was to increase west wind shear across the Caribbean Sea and southwest tropical Atlantic and also to cause anomalous sinking motion across the same area. Neither favored tropical cyclone development.
The combination of these two ingredients made for many atmospheric snares for the tropical cyclones that did develop and hence they were for the most part very short-lived. This combination also routinely formed snares that prevented tropical cyclone formation on many days during the peak of hurricane season.
The predictive skill of seasonal outlooks varies from one year to the next and this year is no exception. Bill Gray and Phil Klotzbach started with a forecast of 14 named storms in December, but that number shrank to 12 in April, 11 in June and 10 by August. The hurricane forecast was no different shrinking from 7 in December to 6 in April, 5 in June and finally to only 4 in August. The trend was correct but the initial forecast was well above what has occurred so far and time is running out.
The 2009 Atlantic Basin hurricane season, at least on paper, does not seem as quiet as it appeared to most of our viewers and coastal residents. There were 8 named storms (the average is 10), but only 2 became hurricanes (the average is 6). Both hurricanes became major hurricanes (the average is 2); Bill reached Category 4 intensity and Fred reached Category 3 intensity. The list of eight named storms and two tropical depressions is shown below.
Only Tropical Storm Claudette made landfall in the U.S. thus far (in the Florida Panhandle). There have been no U.S. hurricane strikes. 7 of the 10 tropical cyclones lasted less than four days and 5 of these lasted two days or less. Only Ana and Bill lasted more than 5 days; Bill being the only true "long-track" Atlantic hurricane of 2009 lasted about 9 days.
Tropical storm Grace formed in the NE Atlantic and goes into the record books as the farthest north tropical storm formation (without first being a subtropical storm). From the track map below it is obvious all named storms, except Claudette, have thus far formed in the Atlantic. Only Anna and Erika have briefly entered the NE Caribbean Sea. So based on tropical storm duration and track behavior it was a very quiet hurricane season for most land areas, including the U.S. This was the quietest hurricane season since 1997 (7 named storms and 3 hurricanes) and the second quietest in the 1995 to 2009 "active era" in terms of storms and hurricanes. It has not been since 1992 that the Atlantic Basin has had only 2 hurricanes in a season! There remains a small portion of hurricane season yet to come, so we say always be prepared just in case.
http://www.weather.com/newscenter/hu...ricane_tracker