[Ghaati]

I personally prefer Weather Underground, for local data. Never heard of Windy before, or Vandusky.

[LKJ1988]

Never heard of any of them. I just use my head and do a much better job.

[kokonutty]

Originally Posted by Corrie22

These people that claim to have read this thread....and got pinpoint accuracy out of it...makes you really shake your head

No one is expecting that

But we should all expect...after $billions of tax payer money....they would at least be as accurate...if not more accurate... as two commercial sites...Ventusky and Windy...that did not get one penny of our money

I don't believe they have the same mission. The National Hurricane Center is charged with providing information to the broadest group of people that may be affected by a storm and looks at a broader set of possibilities in order to do so. The audience of the NHC is probably much less informed in general and probably less frequent miners of information than those of your commercial sites.

The general public is generally not very good at dealing with issues of science. I offer the term "herd immunity" as an example - strictly an example; this is not the place to attempt to either define the term nor opine on its possibilities today.

I would also suggest that much of the data utilized by many commercial weather forecasting organizations is mined from that produced by the National Weather Service and NHC. Without these government agencies the others would need to create their own input.

[apple92680]

Tropical cyclones, are part of the earth's natural processes and they actually carry out a very important task, which is to transfer large amounts of heat from the equator and distribute it throughout the rest of the planet. That is why tropical cyclones always spin up toward the North Pole eventually.

In the southern hemisphere, in places like Australia and Fiji, they spin towards the South Pole.

They are an extremely important mechanism for heat transfer throughout the planet.

So, as the planet continues to warm, it should be expected that tropical cyclone activity will continue and possibly even intensify into the foreseeable future. All one needs to do is look at "Laura" and how rapidly she intensified upon reaching that hot Gulf water.

Scientists have noted a heating of waters in the Gulf of Mexico in recent decades that is believed to be caused by centuries of runoff from pesticides in the Great Plains states, into the tributaries that feed into the Mississippi River. The pesticides have made their way down into the Gulf where there have been large recorded die-offs of ancient coral reefs, fish and flora, and more persistent algae blooms, which cause heating of the water as well.

[Huasho]

Is it to soon to call off the Hurricane Season now ? ? ?

[Corrie22]

Originally Posted by Huasho

Is it to soon to call off the Hurricane Season now ? ? ?

...don't jinx us! LOL

[LKJ1988]

Originally Posted by Huasho

Is it to soon to call off the Hurricane Season now ? ? ?

You could have called it off in 1921 in my area.

[WRnative]

<<Hurricane Laura showcased the improvements made in forecasting a storm’s path. The National Hurricane Center accurately predicted the landfall location to within 0.6 miles, and at nearly the exact time of landfall, 87 hours in advance.>>

https://www.washingtonpost.com/clima...tensification/

As detailed in the above article, forecasting rapid intensification remains an elusive challenge for hurricane prognosticators.

[LKJ1988]

Originally Posted by WRnative

<<Hurricane Laura showcased the improvements made in forecasting a storm’s path. The National Hurricane Center accurately predicted the landfall location to within 0.6 miles, and at nearly the exact time of landfall, 87 hours in advance.>>

https://www.washingtonpost.com/clima...tensification/

As detailed in the above article, forecasting rapid intensification remains an elusive challenge for hurricane prognosticators.

They did a good job bob with this last storm. Would have been another record strong storm if it had 200 more miles of water to work with. A rapid heating planet will cause even stronger storms over the years and then a Cat6 will be on the list. Since the record heat world wide just the last few years we have seen more strong storms norm.

[Corrie22]

Originally Posted by WRnative

<<Hurricane Laura showcased the improvements made in forecasting a storm’s path. The National Hurricane Center accurately predicted the landfall location to within 0.6 miles, and at nearly the exact time of landfall, 87 hours in advance.>>

https://www.washingtonpost.com/clima...tensification/

As detailed in the above article, forecasting rapid intensification remains an elusive challenge for hurricane prognosticators.

...and at the exact same time....totally blew it on Marco

If it were real improvements....and not hype....they would have called both storms

https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/202...y_cone_no_line