Did Hurricane Wilma have 209 mph sustained winds?
At last week's 30th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology of the American Meteorological Society, Dr. Eric Uhlhorn of NOAA's Hurricane Research Division presented a poster that looked at the relationship between surface winds measured by the SFMR instrument and flight-level winds in two Category 5 storms. Hurricane Hunter flights done into Category 5 Supertyphoon Megi (17 October 2010) and Category 5 Hurricane Felix (03 September 2007) found that the surface winds measured by SFMR were greater than those measured at flight level (10,000 feet.) Usually, surface winds in a hurricane are 10 - 15% less than at 10,000 feet, but he showed that in super-intense Category 5 storms with small eyes, the dynamics of these situations may generate surface winds that are as strong or stronger than those found at 10,000 feet. He extrapolated this statistical relationship (using the inertial stability measured at flight level) to Hurricane Wilma of 2005, which was the strongest hurricane on record (882 mb), but was not observed by the SFMR. He estimated that the maximum wind averaged around the eyewall in Wilma at peak intensity could have been 209 mph, plus or minus 20 mph--so conceivably as high as 229 mph, with gusts to 270 mph. Yowza. That's well in excess of the 200 mph minimum wind speed a top end EF-5 tornado has. The Joplin, Missouri EF-5 tornado of May 22, 2011 had winds estimated at 225 - 250 mph. That tornado ripped pavement from the ground, leveled buildings to the concrete slabs they were built on, and killed 161 people. It's not a pretty thought to consider what Wilma would have done to Cancun, Key West, or Fort Myers had the hurricane hit with sustained winds of what the Joplin tornado had.
Figure 1. Hurricane Wilma's pinhole eye as seen at 8:22 a.m. CDT Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2005, by the crew aboard NASA's international space station as the complex flew 222 miles above the storm. At the time, Wilma was the strongest Atlantic hurricane in history, with a central pressure of 882 mb and sustained surface winds estimated at 185 mph. The storm was located in the Caribbean Sea, 340 miles southeast of Cozumel, Mexico. Image source: NASA's Space Photo Gallery.
Figure 2. Damage in Joplin, Missouri after the EF-5 tornado of May 22, 2011. Image credit: wunderphotographer thebige.
Official all-time strongest winds in an Atlantic hurricane: 190 mph
The official record for strongest winds in an Atlantic hurricane is 190 mph, for Hurricane Allen of 1980 as it was entering the Gulf of Mexico, and for Hurricane Camille of 1969, as it was making landfall in Pass Christian, Mississippi. In Dr. Bob Sheets' and Jack Williams' book, Hurricane Watch, they recount the Hurricane Hunters flight into Camile as the hurricane reached peak intensity: On Sunday afternoon, August 17, and Air Force C-130 piloted by Marvin Little penetrated Camille's eye and measured a pressure of 26.62 inches of mercury. "Just as we were nearing the eyewall cloud we suddenly broke into a clear area and could see the sea surface below," the copilot, Robert Lee Clark, wrote in 1982. "What a sight! Although everyone on the crew was experienced except me, no one had seen the wind whip the sea like that before...Instead of the green and white splotches normally found in a storm, the sea surface was in deep furrows running along the wind direction....The velocity was beyond the descriptions used in our training and far beyond anything we had ever seen." So, the 190 mph winds of Camille were an estimate that was off the scale from anything that had ever been observed in the past. The books that the Hurricane Hunters carried, filled with photos of the sea state at various wind speeds, only goes up to 150 mph (Figure 2). I still used this book to estimate surface winds when I flew with the Hurricane Hunters in the late 1980s, and the books are still carried on the planes today. In the two Category 5 hurricanes I flew into, Hugo and Gilbert, I never observed the furrowing effect referred to above. Gilbert had surface winds estimated at 175 mph based on what we measured at flight level, so I believe the 190 mph wind estimate in Camille may be reasonable.
Figure 3. Appearance of the sea surface in winds of 130 knots (150 mph). Image credit: Wind Estimations from Aerial Observations of Sea Conditions (1954), by Charlie Neumann.
Figure 4. Radar image of Hurricane Camille taken at 22:15 UTC August 17, 1969, a few hours before landfall in Mississippi. At the time, Camille had the highest sustained winds of any Atlantic hurricane in history--190 mph.
The infamous hurricane hunter flight into Wilma during its rapid intensification
While I was at last week's conference, I had a conversation with Rich Henning, a flight meteorologist for NOAA's Hurricane Hunters, who served for many years as a Air Reconnaissance Weather Officer (ARWO) for the Air Force Hurricane Hunters. Rich told me the story of the Air Force Hurricane Hunter mission into Hurricane Wilma in the early morning hours of October 19, 2005, as Wilma entered its explosive deepening phase. The previous airplane, which had departed Category 1 Wilma six hours previously, flew through Wilma at an altitude of 5,000 feet. They measured a central pressure of 954 mb when they departed the eye at 23:10 UTC. The crew of the new plane assumed that the hurricane, though intensifying, was probably not a major hurricane, and decided that they would also go in at 5,000 feet. Winds outside the eyewall were less than hurricane force, so this seemed like a reasonable assumption. Once the airplane hit the eyewall, they realized their mistake. Flight level winds quickly rose to 186 mph, far in excess of Category 5 strength, and severe turbulence rocked the aircraft. The aircraft was keeping a constant pressure altitude to maintain their height above the ocean during the penetration, but the area of low pressure at Wilma's center was so intense that the airplane descended at over 1,000 feet per minute during the penetration in order to maintain a constant pressure altitude. By they time they punched into the incredibly tiny 4-mile wide eye, which had a central pressure of just 901 mb at 04:32 UTC, the plane was at a dangerously low altitude of 1,500 feet--not a good idea in a Category 5 hurricane. The pilot ordered an immediate climb, and the plane exited the other side of Wilma's eyewall at an altitude of 10,000 feet. They maintained this altitude for the remainder of the flight. During their next pass through the eye at 06:11 UTC, the diameter of the eye had shrunk to an incredibly tiny two miles--the smallest hurricane eye ever measured. During their third and final pass through the eye at 0801 UTC, a dropsonde found a central pressure of 882 mb--the lowest pressure ever observed in an Atlantic hurricane. In the span of just 24 hours, Wilma had intensified from a 70 mph tropical storm to a 175 mph category 5 hurricane--an unprecedented event for an Atlantic hurricane. Since the pressure was still falling, it is likely that Wilma became even stronger after the mission departed.
I'll have a new post by Tuesday at the latest.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
1008 AM EDT MON APR 30 2012
AMZ630-650-651-670-671-301615-
BISCAYNE BAY-
COASTAL WATERS FROM JUPITER INLET TO DEERFIELD BEACH, FL OUT 20 NM-
COASTAL WATERS FROM DEERFIELD BEACH TO OCEAN REEF, FL OUT 20 NM-
WATERS FROM JUPITER INLET TO DEERFIELD BEACH, FL EXTENDING FROM
20 NM TO 60 NM-
WATERS FROM DEERFIELD BEACH TO OCEAN REEF, FL EXTENDING FROM 20 NM
TO THE TERRITORIAL WATERS OF THE BAHAMAS-
1008 AM EDT MON APR 30 2012
.NOW...
WIDESPREAD SHOWERS WILL CONTINUE ACROSS THE ATLANTIC WATERS AND
BISCAYNE BAY THIS MORNING. MOST OF THE ACTIVITY CONTINUES TO BE TO
THE EAST OF MIAMI DADE AND BROWARD COUNTIES. THESE SHOWERS WILL
MOVE WEST NEAR 20 KNOTS AND PRODUCE DOWNPOURS...SOMETIMES HEAVY
AND GUSTY WINDS TO NEAR 30 KNOTS WITH THE HEAVIEST SHOWERS. AN
OCCASIONAL LIGHTNING STRIKE IS POSSIBLE WITH THIS ACTIVITY.
$$
At Ft. Charlotte, they had 0.67 inches on Saturday, 5.07 inches on Sunday, and 0.69 so far today. But by my house... it's been more like 1 inch saturday, 6.5 inches on Sunday, and 1.76 inches so far today. It is still pouring and will likely be pouring all day. I want sunshine :(
April 29, 2012
That's quite some accumulation..what's up Thrawst?
That's some siginificant wave height....hey hydrus
So no fun...
Was about to say, I noticed yesterday it seemed to be raining more heavily on the N side of the island than it was on the S side...
Much cooler than last year
Good morning Baha...you guys are really getting it
The bad news? The chances of any residual moisture moving up the peninsula looks fairly low as the ridge just to the north looks to hold it's ground through the week.
However by the end of the week towards this weekend, that lower-lever trough(or whats left of it) should continue westbound and eventually lift up towards the Lake Charles/Galveston coastline. This will enable some moisture to try to evect as far north as Sarasota/Okeechobee by Friday(possibly as far north as Melbourne).
Now further north I'm afraid the ridge will more or less win out. But a stray afternoon or evening thunderstorm is not entirely out of the question(especially the further south you go) if(when) it overcomes the CAPE.
On a side-note, some models actually try do develop this after-mentioned mid-upper lever trough by next week. Hmmm?
The NAO is going negative, so we are likely to see steady warming over the next week or so
Storms Sat. eve killed one retired Ironworker from Waterloo, IL and injured around 100 more at a tent outside an establishment near Busch when it was lifted by winds that came through after Cards-Brewers game and before Blues-Kings playoff game.
at least let there be some type of entertainment from this system... like lightning xD
ooh. I must have missed that one.
Morning Nigel,
Hey you take your finals yet. I remember you mentioning you had them coming up. Hoes the weather.
Oh, yeah! Well, I saw it on FRIDAY. lol
Getting hammered there a little, huh, Baha. Raining heavy on the coast here right now. Windy, too!
Morning pedley. Yes I did, I took them last week...it's currently partly cloudy
April 29, 2012
I meant to say "Hows," the weather. Didn't mean to bring farm implements into the conversation.
So did you Ace them or don't you know yet?
Yes. Hey, 7544 Long time no see.
I felt upon leaving the exam room, so I just have to wait for the result
Ja, wie meine Brille, zum Beispiel! Du Esel, du! LOL
Link
I grew up in NE Arkansas and we had tornadoes all the time... we had a storm shelter just off the kitchen and garage laundry room. did not even have to go out in the bad weather to get in it.
During the 1968 and 1973 bad tornadoes in the Jonesboro, AR area.. it was necessary... However I was in the 1973 tornado in Jonesboro in a bathtub (not at home in the storm house) when that one hit and split open the roof of the house we were at to ride out the storm.
Good morning everyone... raining again here in Broward County. as of 8am this morning have dumped total of 6.4" of rainfall since Saturday morning.
That is a lot of rain.
Good morning gamma...interesting life story
I'm guessing that Drummond copyright photo (comment 1416) was from Osage County, OK last night. Hope no one was driving the vehicle when that crap hit. (Add: Nevermind. I see this David Drummond is a chaser from TX.)
Just FYI...
add: image credit, Oklahooma mesonet rainfall page
Got skunked (cribbage term, not a real skunky thing) where I live in Central OK but N OK got some heavy rain last night in just a few hours. There were still some flood warnings up there this morning.
(LOL. mod. Seeing-double image removed, and image credit added)
Hope you all have a great day!
Link
Select "Regional Summary"
Grothar...............Did they go through with the Air & Sea show on Ft. Lauderdale beach this past weekend?
A really good primer on this issue and I would not be surprised if Dr. M is looking at our current system and he will probably address these issues in his next post.
Link
Cool.
Too early to tell what could happen but I would only note that the system originated as an extra-tropical entity attached to the recent cold front and you can see that it is slowly trying to detach from the front and become a self-sustained entity. However, wind shear is very daunting and I would not expect a tropical storm to form buy maybe sub-tropical.
That is my amateur "wannabe" take on the disturbance...Waiting to see Dr. M's take on what could happen over the next 24 hours.
Any comments would be welcome.
I doubt it, it's currently sitting below 10N...so it unlikely that it would be able to gather enough spin
Thunderbirds on Saturday did a very abbreviated show. I was at the beach on Friday for the practice - much more impressive. And no crowds!
According to the media, Sunday was cancelled due to water on the ground. It probably would been cancelled anyway due to the low ceiling, but I don't think it got that far.
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