Irene is history. Now another tropical system brewing

For all of the talk concerning Irene being blown out of proportion, areas from New Jersey to New England are still under water. Hundreds of thousands of people are still without power.  The bottom line: Never underestimate hurricanes.

We are entering the peak hurricane season

All eyes are on the eastern Atlantic where another tropical system is in its infancy.

The question remains whether or not this "soon to be" hurricane (by Thursday) will take a similar track to Irene.

Here are several different projections: You can see the "blob" in the center by Sunday

Here is the projection by NEXT THURSDAY (10 days away). The projections take the hurricane north and away from land next week.

So if you are heading to Disney over the next several weeks, watch the tropics. Its going to get real bumpy.

Hurricane Irene Could Another Katrina!

I pointed out last week that the US was more than likely going to get hit with a major hurricane. While the projections at the time pointed to Florida (projections that far out are shots in the dark) the overriding theme was to prepare for a major hurricane sooner than later.  Then earlier this week, as I pointed out in my most recent post, then Tropical Storm Irene was showing signs of hitting the east coast and possibly New York City.  Now, Irene is a category 3 hurricane with winds of 115 mph with a northerly movement. I'll be posting updates on my FACEBOOK FANPAGE which sends updates to my twitter page.





Even though the eye of the hurricane is relatively small, the overall size of the hurricane is almost the size of Texas!

The 1938 hurricane rainfall totals were extensive. Irene could mirror these totals.

Should this hurricane hit anywhere from NYC to Long Island as the projections have been indicating over the last 24 hours, the cost could be mindboggling.

Nate Silver, a statistician who has a column on the New York Times website called fivethirtyeightblog calculated what the cost would be if a hurricane hit New York City. His results are mindnumbing:

The bottom line is that this hurricane could be another Katrina OR WORSE!  The economic impact will be long lasting.  Gas prices for us will shoot up!  Cost of food will climb.  The financial markets will be hit hard.  If this happens, the cost will be felt by EVERYONE!

Hurricane Irene - Soon to be an East Coast Reality

If you read my post from last week, many meteorologists including myself were predicting a dangerous hurricane to develop in the Atlantic with a high chance of it making landfall along the east coast of the United States. The computer were showing this more than 10 days in advance. Predictions that far out are often times "shots in the dark". This time, it was right on the money.

If you are vacationing anywhere from the east coast of Florida to Savannah & Hilton Head especially Myrtle Beach/Wilmington, N.C. and the Outer Banks (my vacation spot from when I was a kid), remember that this storm will pack winds of 120+ mph along with a powerful storm surge.

Residents along the SE coast are used to the threat of tropical systems, not areas from Cape Hatteras to New York City.  Yet the threat of a Hurricane making landfall near New York City is real.  Take a look at just a few of the hurricanes that made landfall around New York City.  Notice that most of the tracks look similar to Hurricane Irene. The first one in the list is an old weather map drawn on the day of the NYC hurricane in 1893

Will Irene be similar? Stay tuned.....

Hurricane Projections Getting Interesting

So far this year, hurricane season has been very quiet. A few storms developed in the central Atlantic. Those storms didn't last long.  But notice the storm track. The steering currents have curved each storm to the northeast.

The focus of attention in the weeks ahead will be over the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. While no storm (as of this writing--August 18th) has developed yet, all of the computer projections show rapid development of one area of storms into a formidable hurricane late next week

We look at 3 distinct projections.  The GFS model, the Canadian model and the European Model.

The GFS (American) Model by next Saturday the 28th show a hurricane near Florida

The Canadian Model shows the same hurricane near the Carolina coast

The European Model shows it near Florida

Whether or not this actual verifies remains to be seen. The bottom line is that the computer are seeing the tropics becoming very active very soon and very fast. Based on a multitude of factors, I believe that the US will be hit with a hurricane at some point this season. Stay tuned!

Players Aren't Seeing the Pitches They Used To

Have certain pitches become more common place in recent years?

Here are the number of players over the last 10 seasons who were pitched 60% fastballs or more. Other pitches and their percentages follow.

Notice that the number of players who saw 60% fastballs has seen a THREEFOLD DROP since 2006. Players who saw more than 15% of their pitches as sliders have steadily increased since 2004.  Curveball percentages saw a drop then an increase the last 3 seasons while changeup percentages have stayed fairly steady throughout.

While the number of players who hit more than 50% of batted balls as groundballs has stayed steady, the number of players who have swung at more than 25% of pitches out of the strikezone has risen 500%!

The bottom line: Pitching overall is getting better.  Batters are getting fooled more than they did just 5 years ago.

103 movies so far...here is the list in no particular order

Inception
Get him to the Greek
The Other GUys
Restrepo
Winter's Bone
Despicable Me
The Green Zone
Dr. Strangelove/Atomic Bomb
The Atomic Cafe
The Kids are Alright

I Love you Philip Morris
The Fog of War
Collosus: The Forbin Project
The Black Swan
Idaho Transfer
Megamind
The Fighter
Eraserhead
Winnebago Man
The Wind that Shakes the Barley

Get Low
The Kings Speech
Unstoppable
The Company Men
Phonebooth
True Grit
Hardware
Insomnia
The Prestige
127 Hours

Chinatown
The China Syndrome
Judgement at Nurenberg
Nuclear Tipping POint
Saw
Innerspace
Buried
Carlos the Jackel
Timecode
Persepolis

Being John Malcovich
Easy A
Rounders
The Illusionist
Grandma's Boy
Altered States
Rango
American Splendor
25th Hour
The Great Santini

Crumb
All Good Things
Exit thru the Giftshop
Y Tu Mama Tambrien
Eastern Promises
Surviving Hitler
Fairgame
The Limey
Love and other Drugs
Slipstream

A Film Unfinished
Freakonomics
Bus 174
Inside Job
Blue Valentine
Salt
London Boulevard
Limitless
28 Days Later
No Man's Land

Blood Diamond
The Last Picture Show
Battlefield: LA
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
The Way Back
4192
Cache
Biutiful
Hangover 2
Synedoche NY

The Wild, Wonderful Whites of WV
The Lincoln Lawyer
Wasteland
Source Code
Gasland
Super 8
The White Ribbon
Rabbit Hole
The Tourist
City of God

Hall Pass
Seven Samurai
Wings of Desire
Adjustment Bureau
Animal Kingdom
Due Date
Monsters
Pathfinders: In the Co. of Strangers
Secret in their eyes
Xmen: First Class

Into Eternity
Unknown
Paul

Random Weather notes, the tropics and the heat

August is here.

Summer is going fast.  Yet there is alot to talk about weatherwise as the summer peaks and hurricane season continues to rapidly develop.  So this post on Scott's World of Weather will be a hodge-podge of topics.

First, my 90 degree prediction of "7 days".  Yep, it went up in smoke a week and a half ago.  There were several reasons for my busted prediction.  The first was the over-emphasis of the massive spring rainfall.  We had the wettest April/May period on record.  Usually, wet ground keeps high temperatures down a bit.  This did happen in the spring and early summer (June).  Average temps (day and night combined) in June were a notch below 70. For comparison, the 10th coolest month was June of 1902 with an average temp of 62.  We did have one day above 90 on June 4th.

The second reason was the underestimation of the strength of heat ridge in the middle of the country.  The La Nina winter/spring we had had a cooling effect on the atmosphere across the country.  Droughts in Oklahoma and Texas are common in these summers after a La Nina.

This drought promoted further growth of the ridge of heat. The moist ground and the trough over Ohio kept the ridge from pushing east.  Eventually in July, the trough flattened and the ridge slid into Ohio and the Great Lakes in an albeit weaker state.  The result was a burst of heat that culminated in 6 quick 90 degree days which killed my prediction by July 21st.  The high that day was 97, the hottest day in Cleveland since 1995.

The third was my overemphasizing of the MJO.  The MJO or the Madden Julian Oscillation is the cyclical movement of tropical convection that can directly influence the position of the jet stream in North America. CLICK TO ANIMATE THE IMAGE

Without going into too much detail, it seemed that the MJO reacted in such a way as to promote more eastward warmth than eastward "cooling". Again, it wasn't the strongest MJO signal but could have played a small part.

WILL AUGUST BE AS CONSISTANTLY WARM AS JULY, CHECK BACK AT THE END OF THE WEEK. I'LL HAVE THE "FORECAST PATTERN" FOR AUGUST.

As for the temperature numbers, here are the number of 80 and 90 degree days through July 31st over the last 5 summers:

Now for the tropics.  Tropical storm EMILY is now churning in the Caribbean as I write this.

The forecast brings this system very close to the US coastline by the end of the week.

The origin of hurricanes which make US landfall show most of them develop in the Gulf of Mexico

The Next 5+ Years of MLB Hall of Fame Voting

Under the most basic of circumstances, predicting hall of fame voting of any sort is a futile exercise.  Yet the upcoming 5 years or so of MLB Hall of Fame voting will feature players that played in an era that was anything but "basic" or "normal" when compared to the historical mean.

This crop of retired players who are or soon will be eligible for Hall of Fame consideration played between the early 1990s and mid to late 2000s.  This era is so heavily associated with performance enhancing drugs that some want the statistics for these 10 to 15 years to be either rubber-stamped with asterisks or completely eradicated from all historical record.  Ultra traditionalists go so as far as branding this era as immoral and unethical.  "Purge the inflated numbers like the contagion they are!", some cry.  Anyway, you get the point that this is still fresh in people's minds 7-plus years after mandatory drug testing was implemented.

Which brings me back to the Hall of Fame. Starting next year, more and more players will be on the ballot from the 1990s era.  So here is what I think the voting will look like from 2012 to 2017.  There is nothing scientific about my methodology although I tried to take into account the typical voter's "passionate" viewpoint on the players in question. The only prerequisite is that I started with the Top 10 vote getters in 2011 as the starting list in 2012.  Here is what I came up with along with a few carry-overs from year to year.

You'll notice that I don't have Schilling or Pedro Martinez voted in.  Not because they are not deserving but because they're are other players who I believe will be voted before them.

2012

Barry Larkin    3rd    62.1%    YES
Jack Morris    13th    53.5%    YES

Lee Smith    10th    45.3%    NO
Jeff Bagwell        2nd    41.7%    NO
Tim Raines    5th    37.5%    NO
E. Martinez    3rd    32.9%    NO
Trammell    11th    24.3%    NO
Walker        2nd    20.3%    NO
McGwire    6th    19.8%    NO
Mcgriff        3rd    17.9%    NO

2013

Legitimate hold-overs from 2012 who have a good shot:

Bagwell        YES
Lee Smith    NO

Bonds        NO
Clemens    NO
Piazza        Maybe
Sosa        NO
Schilling        Maybe
Biggio        YES

2014

Legitamate hold-overs from 2013

Schilling    NO
Piazza        Maybe

Maddux        YES
Thomas        YES
Glavine        YES

2015

Legitamate hold-over from 2014

Piazza        Maybe

R. Johnson    YES
P. Martinez     NO
Smoltz        YES
Sheffield        NO

2016

Legitamate hold-over from 2015

Piazza

Ken Griffey, Jr    YES
Billy Wagner     NO
Trevor Hoffman    YES

2017

M. Ramirez    NO

(assumming they retire at the end of 2011)

Vizquel        YES
Thome        YES

High Temperatures above 95 since 1980

This graphic tells it all.  Most of these days occurred in the drought summer of 1988. We should easily make it above 95 today.  Already 90 and its only 11AM.

June 15th to July 17th Temperatures Since 1991

We are in the midst of our first heat wave across northern Ohio.  Temperatures will stay above 90 for several days until the heat pushes back to the west late this weekend.  Is this type of heat across the country common or a rarity?  Below is a plot of temperatures compared to normal for JUNE 15th through JULY 17th for each of the last 20 years starting with this year.  Warmer colors indicate temperatures above normal.

Check out 1998 and 1994.  The heat looks very similar to what has been going on most of this summer.

Notice the core of the heat in Oklahoma and Texas

Heat last year was along the East Coast, Washington, D.C.

Two year ago, the heat was once again over Texas

Heat in 2008 was along the West Coast. Cooler in the Great Lakes

Heat in 2007 in the Pacific Northwest

2006 featured heat in the norther tier and out West

2005 heat:  Central Plains

Very little heat here

Cooler temps from Texas to New York

Heat across the northern 1/2 of the US

Heat out west in 2001

Heat in the deep south/cooler north

Heat in New england, cooler in the deep south

Look familiar? Heat across Texas and Oklahoma

Temps stayed near normal

Heat over Texas; cooler in the Great Lakes

Well below normal out west; heat in Canada

Look familar? Heat in Texas, New Mexico and in New England

In 1993, heat was located East

Temps well below normal across most of the US

Heat across the Great Lakes; cooler than normal out west