07/05/05 -- TALK: Hurricane Dennis

[Kevin Walter]

TTUHIT (Hurricane Intercept Team) has our towers in a micro-array just west of Pensacola (unfortunately just west of the eye) for a very specific research initiative. UF also has similar 10m towers which they deployed in a more general spread-out array, including a tower in Pensacola, Navarre, and Destin. The Navarre tower recorded a 0.1 sec gust of something like 125 mph, with a 3 sec gust of something like 120 mph. The Pensacola tower was in the upper 90s to near 100 mph. Check out the raw data for yourself in near real time at www.ce.ufl.edu/~fcmp , click on the "real time data" link on the left, and navigate through the folders (labeled in EST) to investigate some of the wind histories.

 

[Kevin Walter]

Interestingly, maybe I'm reading this data wrong and someone can correct me, but all of the wind speeds from the 5 meter level on these towers are significantly larger than the 10 meter level. For example, the Navarre Tower (T0 upload at 15:24) has 3-sec winds at 120mph at 5 meter height and 59 mph 3-sec winds at 10 meter height!

:?

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

Instrumentation problems:

*

Tower T0 had experience problems with the 10 meters Wind Monitor and the 10 meters Gills Anemometers, refer to the 5 meters Gills Anemometers for analysis purposes.

Aaron

 

[Kevin Walter]

Whew. That makes a little more sense.

 

[MClarkson]

navarre tower... where the strongest winds would be expected...

http://grove.ufl.edu/~fcmp/Dennis/T0/NOAA-...10-19-09-00.txt

0.1 Sec 58.9 m/s ( 131.8 mph) @ 104.3° @ 10/19:22:45


so a gust to 130mph

not bad.

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

I would be extremely careful of using 0.1s wind data. At that interval, prop vane anemometers can "overspeed". I'd rather look at intervals of at least one minute.

Aaron

 

[Sam Sagnella]

I have never laughed so hard in my entire life, as I just laughed at the MSNBC reporter trying to assess the damage to her hotel in Pensacola (Beach?). She described "MIGHTY" trees being heavily damaged (Not really that mighty...kinda "SKINNY"). A Ramada hotel was apparently being "held together" by the locals holed up inside. I am still laughing.

 

[Stan Olson]

Geraldo (Fox News) just talked with 2 storm chasers from Norman, OK on there from his location in Pensacola. Any thoughts on who they are? They were in a blue pickup with a weird shaped 'thing' on the hood with several antennas / anemometer on the top/back.

Stan

 

[Sam Sagnella]

Tornado warning in effect for the Atlanta metro, and there is a fairly well defined couplet over the city's east side, tracking WNW. Current track takes it over densely populated areas of central/southern Fulton County.

 

[Owen Shieh]

The rotation in eastern Atlanta missed me by only 1-2 miles, but yeah, the aftereffects of Dennis will linger on well into the next couple of days. One reason Dennis held together so well until right before landfall was because of the lack of dry air intrusion. However, that comes with lower tornado potential. But that should change soon as mid-latitude dynamics come into play and set up a potential for scattered tropical tornadoes. I'm sure some others on this board would be more knowledgeable about these phenomena. This should be the highlight from now on. Too bad the eastern U.S. does not have the luxury of tree-less flat praries to easily chase and observe these tropical-induced tornadoes.

 

[Aaron Kennedy]

Geraldo (Fox News) just talked with 2 storm chasers from Norman, OK on there from his location in Pensacola. Any thoughts on who they are? They were in a blue pickup with a weird shaped 'thing' on the hood with several antennas / anemometer on the top/back.

Sounds like RJ Evans in his blue SUV with hailshield on the hood and anemometers up top. I think Roger Edwards is with him, but don't quote me on that one.

Aaron

 

[Brandon Clement]

Half way home from Hurricane Dennis, I will give a full report when I get home.

If anyone has the wind reports for the Pensacola Area please post them or email me thanks

 

[Owen Shieh]

Ok, that makes sense...yes Roger Edwards is with R.J. Evans I believe. The Weather Channel received their report earlier as I had mentioned a few posts back. I can't recall if they've posted on ST in recent history though.

 

[MClarkson]

http://photos.pensacolanewsjournal.com/

a good site for damage photos

 

[Joe Nield]

This has the potential to be a MAJOR disaster for central and southern Indiana.

According to the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center:

Oh. Crap.

The only saving grace may be that the state has been relatively dry since the widespread 1-3 inch rains of the remnants of Arlene back on 11-13 June. However, 17 inches falling on the confluence of the White and Wabash Basins would be absolutely unbelievable.

It's going to be a busy couple of weeks for us at IND.