The 2016 North Atlantic Hurricane Season officially starts today, June 1st, and runs through November 30th. Although the focus on tropical weather development is naturally stronger during this time, being prepared for inclement weather is not something one does during a specific time of year. It needs to be a way of life and a way of conducting one’s business operations.
There is no magic switch to turn on that causes tropical systems to develop in-season. In fact, off-season tropical storms and hurricanes are a frequent occurrence, and significant (named) storms in May are commonplace.
There have even been storms in December and January, and twice, a tropical cyclone/ hurricane has spanned over two calendar years – Hurricane Alice in 1954 and Tropical Storm Zeta in 2005. Moreover, in today’s world we are not only looking at tropical systems in one ocean (The commonly referred to hurricane seasons are the North Atlantic and North Pacific.) Significant tropical storms happen all around the world, year-round.
Television broadcasters must keep their most valuable asset – people (and their expertise) – available at all times and well-equipped with robust tools to create content for weather news stories anywhere on the planet, all throughout the year.
Providing valuable severe weather content is true craftsmanship, which is dependent on access to a high-powered graphics system, fueled with a plethora of data products to visualize the developing story. With a system like Metacast from ChyronHego, access to data from dozens of forecast centers worldwide can be at the meteorologists’ and journalists’ fingertips. The video clip below illustrates Hurricane Patricia approaching the coast of Baja California towards the end of the Hurricane Season in 2015.
As we transition from an El Niño pattern - a higher than normal sea surface temperature in the central and east-central equatorial Pacific, to La Niña – a lower than normal temperature in the eastern Pacific, two of the world’s leading tropical weather forecast centers (US-based NOAA and European ECMWF) are forecasting an average tropical weather outlook for both the North Atlantic and the North Pacific hurricane seasons. This is based on long-term forecast analysis from the CFS (Climate Forecast System) and the long-range ECMWF models, which analyze and simulate the interaction between the Earth's oceans, land and atmosphere.
Until next time, stay weather aware and weather prepared!
Karl Eggestad, Global Sales Director Metacast, ChyronHego
