First Hurricane Sandy, now Winter Storm Athena for the Eastern U.S.
Winter Storm Warnings are up for Southwest New Jersey, Northern Delaware, and Southeast Pennsylvania, including Philadelphia, PA, where Winter Storm Athena is expected to drop 3 - 5" of snow today through Thursday morning. Slushy accumulations of up to 1" are likely in Baltimore, and non-accumulating snow will fall as far south as Washington, DC. Athena, the season's first Nor'easter and first winter storm to get a name under The Weather Channel's new naming system, is spreading rain and high winds into Southern New Jersey and Eastern Long Island, NY this morning. Winds at buoy 44025, about 40 miles offshore from the coast of Central New Jersey, reached 40 mph, gusting to 49 mph, with a significant wave height of 14', at noon EST. Winds at Nantucket, MA have gusted as high as 54 mph this morning. Athena is building a storm surge that has already reached 2.2' at Atlantic City and 1.8' at New York City as of noon EST. A storm surge of 2 - 3.5' is likely along the section of coast most heavily damaged by Sandy's storm surge, and battering waves up to 20' high will cause moderate beach erosion along much of the New Jersey and New York shoreline. The storm surge will cause minor to moderate flooding during this afternoon's high tide cycle near 1 pm EST, and again at the next high tide, near 1 am EST Thursday morning. Fortunately, the high tides this week will be some of the lowest of the month, since we are midway between the new moon and full moon. Wind gusts from Athena will likely reach 50 mph along the coasts of New Jersey and Southern Long Island, NY, and could hit 60 mph on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. I expect that Athena's winds, rains, and wet, heavy snows will cause up to 50,000 new power outages today. As of early Wednesday morning, 676,000 customers were still without power in the wake of Hurricane Sandy (down from a peak of 8.5 million customers.)
Figure 1. Winter Storm Athena as seen at 9:01 am EST November 7, 2012. Image credit: NOAA/GSFC.
Figure 2. Predicted storm surge at Sandy Hook, NJ, for Winter Storm Athena, from the experimental Extratropical Storm Surge model, run by NOAA's Meteorological Development Laboratory. This model used winds from this morning's 6Z (1 am EDT) run of the GFS model. The peak storm surge (yellowish-brown line) is predicted to be 3.4', occurring Wednesday evening. High tide (green line) occurs near 1 pm Wednesday afternoon, resulting in a peak storm tide of approximately 7.2' around 1 pm Wednesday (black line). For comparison, Sandy delivered a 8.6' storm surge to Sandy Hook before their tide gauge failed, with the storm tide reaching 13.2' above MLLW (Mean Lower Low Water.)
The decision to name Athena
The Weather Channel announced in October that they would begin naming winter storms this year, in an effort to aid in raising awareness and reduce the risks the public faces. One of the main criteria for naming a storm is its impact on populated areas; the meteorology of the storm may not get it named, if the storm doesn't affect a populated area. If Hurricane Sandy had not devastated the region of coast being affected by today's Winter Storm Athena, it may not have gotten a name. With so many people still under recovery efforts even well inland, the combination of heavy, wet snow and wind prompted the decision to name Athena. The models have been trending towards more cold air getting pulled into this system, so it is possible Athena could drop heavier snows than currently advertised. The National Weather Service will not be referring to today's Nor'easter as "Athena". They put out this internal directive: "The NWS does not use named winter storms in our products. Please refrain from using the term Athena in any of our products."
Here are the peak wind gusts from Athena as of 11 am EST on Wednesday, November 7, 2012:
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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Newtawrsh-orkanen New Year's Storm (Orkanen actually means hurricane.
WEHW42 PHEB 071643
TIBHWX
HIZ001>003-005>009-012>014-016>021-023>026-071843 -
TSUNAMI INFORMATION STATEMENT NUMBER 1
NWS PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER EWA BEACH HI
643 AM HST WED NOV 07 2012
TO - CIVIL DEFENSE IN THE STATE OF HAWAII
SUBJECT - TSUNAMI INFORMATION STATEMENT
THIS STATEMENT IS FOR INFORMATION ONLY. NO ACTION REQUIRED.
AN EARTHQUAKE HAS OCCURRED WITH THESE PRELIMINARY PARAMETERS
ORIGIN TIME - 0636 AM HST 07 NOV 2012
COORDINATES - 14.0 NORTH 92.2 WEST
LOCATION - OFF THE COAST OF CHIAPAS MEXICO
MAGNITUDE - 7.5 MOMENT
EVALUATION
BASED ON ALL AVAILABLE DATA A DESTRUCTIVE PACIFIC-WIDE TSUNAMI IS
NOT EXPECTED AND THERE IS NO TSUNAMI THREAT TO HAWAII. REPEAT. A
DESTRUCTIVE PACIFIC-WIDE TSUNAMI IS NOT EXPECTED AND THERE IS NO
TSUNAMI THREAT TO HAWAII.
THIS WILL BE THE ONLY STATEMENT ISSUED FOR THIS EVENT UNLESS
ADDITIONAL DATA ARE RECEIVED.
$$
WEPA42 PHEB 071641
TIBPAC
TSUNAMI BULLETIN NUMBER 001
PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER/NOAA/NWS
ISSUED AT 1641Z 07 NOV 2012
THIS BULLETIN APPLIES TO AREAS WITHIN AND BORDERING THE PACIFIC
OCEAN AND ADJACENT SEAS...EXCEPT ALASKA...BRITISH COLUMBIA...
WASHINGTON...OREGON AND CALIFORNIA.
... TSUNAMI INFORMATION BULLETIN ...
THIS BULLETIN IS FOR INFORMATION ONLY.
THIS BULLETIN IS ISSUED AS ADVICE TO GOVERNMENT AGENCIES. ONLY
NATIONAL AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES HAVE THE AUTHORITY TO MAKE
DECISIONS REGARDING THE OFFICIAL STATE OF ALERT IN THEIR AREA AND
ANY ACTIONS TO BE TAKEN IN RESPONSE.
AN EARTHQUAKE HAS OCCURRED WITH THESE PRELIMINARY PARAMETERS
ORIGIN TIME - 1636Z 07 NOV 2012
COORDINATES - 14.0 NORTH 92.2 WEST
DEPTH - 33 KM
LOCATION - OFF THE COAST OF CHIAPAS MEXICO
MAGNITUDE - 7.5
EVALUATION
NO DESTRUCTIVE WIDESPREAD TSUNAMI THREAT EXISTS BASED ON
HISTORICAL EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI DATA.
HOWEVER - EARTHQUAKES OF THIS SIZE SOMETIMES GENERATE LOCAL
TSUNAMIS THAT CAN BE DESTRUCTIVE ALONG COASTS LOCATED WITHIN
A HUNDRED KILOMETERS OF THE EARTHQUAKE EPICENTER. AUTHORITIES
IN THE REGION OF THE EPICENTER SHOULD BE AWARE OF THIS
POSSIBILITY AND TAKE APPROPRIATE ACTION.
THIS WILL BE THE ONLY BULLETIN ISSUED FOR THIS EVENT UNLESS
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION BECOMES AVAILABLE.
THE WEST COAST/ALASKA TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER WILL ISSUE PRODUCTS
FOR ALASKA...BRITISH COLUMBIA...WASHINGTON...OREGON...CALIFORNIA.
LOL. That means "Uncomfortable Winter Storm."
NYC live.
Just spoke to my brother in Lloyd Harbor. Lights have been going on and off. The wind is getting a little stronger.
??? !!!
Hope everyone is OK...
(The dots on the map above indicate a location where someone has reported to the USGS having felt the quake. The color represents the intensity of shaking felt and the size of the dot represents the size of the city in which the shaking was reported. It's notable that one of our Belize (?) posters also felt this quake, despite it occurring on the far side of the isthmus from Belize).
Well you dont expect the same government that couldnt pass a budget and put everything off till after the election to agree now so suddenly did you?
Neither did investors.
This is congress, not only reelected with single digit approval ratings, but also reelected with nearly the same or more partisanship than it had before. And a lot of the companies in the stock market backed Romney too, so part of this was expected from that as well.
Oh right its 2012....somewehere a Mayan stone carver is quietly chuckling away.
Quake hits off Guatemala coast, felt as far away as Mexico
GUATEMALA CITY | Wed Nov 7, 2012 12:00pm EST
GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) - A strong earthquake off the coast of Guatemala on Wednesday shook buildings in Guatemala City and San Salvador and was felt as far away as Mexico City, Reuters witnesses said, but there were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck off the Central American nation's Pacific coastline, 28 miles southwest of Champerico, Guatemala, near the border with Mexico. The epicenter was 25 miles below the surface.
A Reuters witness in Guatemala City said people were evacuating homes in parts of the capital, and firefighters and rescue workers were on alert. Office workers were also evacuating buildings in Mexico City.
(Reporting By Mike McDonald in Guatemala City and Nelson Renteria in San Salvador; Editing by Eric Beech)
Oh geez. My sisters cable actually just went back out, but she has her power, luckily. I have a feeling quite a lot of customers will be out soon again.
And the wind is definitely picking up. Windows are rattling. Got the wood stove going, flashlights, batteries, and all that good stuff in arms reach ;)
Milford, CT here. Just went from 150 outages on ui's website to over 2000.
A lot of the heaviest snow appears to be in connecticut, although a I've found a little bit in south NJ.
Heavy snow band going through Central to West Connecticut now
just fyi, you should check the percentage of popular vote vs the last 6 elections.
Tornado near Tipton, OK November 7, 2011. Click image for NWS Norman write up on Nov 7-8, 2011 severe weather events...
Sometimes sarcasm is the only thing that works. Yeah, nothing wrong with naming (add: winter) storms. NWS could, maybe should do it, and take the lead in doing it based on meteorology, not on how many TV viewers might be affected.
Probably some of you don't understand what I'm trying to say, so I'll shut up. Best wishes to those Back East as this noreaster rolls on through.
"Back in St. Olaf..." :)
and a snow covered cam:
New meaning to "TD" Banknorth!
How about the Con Ed Super-Storm?
Update 18:05 UTC : Rescue services have confirmed that 2 people have been killed in San Marcos (Edilsa Castillo Merida, age 47 and her niece Melany Castillo age 6 months). An assessment of the damage is coordinated by Conred Guatemala and is currently going on.
Update 17:58 UTC : Guatemalan president Otto Pérez Molina has called the Red Alert in the country after the massive earthquake who struck a little earlier.
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