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A
long time from now but we do not like the concentration
of all sorts of nice parameters necessary to create
trouble. The ‘tropical wave’ itself is not
dangerous. No, not at all. Nevertheless, as a tropical
disturbance she might be able to catalyst within 12
hours a storm which on her turn could initiate a tropical
cyclone. That is the reason why we have to monitor a
‘wave’ that consists of a bunch of clouds
that decides to travel from east to west over the ocean.
Often the ‘wave’ is quite big, covering ten
degrees of latitude (600 nautical miles) and five degrees
of longitude (300 nautical miles). The average speed
of a ‘wave’ is 10 to 15 knots or roughly equivalent
to 4 to 6 degrees of longitude in 24 hours. Sometimes
a few waves travel at 20-30 knots, but that is quite
rare. ‘Waves’ travel with a consistently speed
over the globe, which makes the moment of an encounter
predictable. Always remember that a slow moving ‘tropical
wave’ has to be monitored more carefully than a
fast one. A slow moving one is more likely to turn into
a tropical depression, than a fast moving brother or
sister.The extensive cloud cover associated with a ‘tropical
wave’ produces rain, sometimes quite heavily ‘rainstorms’,
30 to 35 knots of wind (sometimes gusting to 50) and
sometimes severe thunder or even severe thunderstorms
which is not cute at all. Sometimes the rain pours down
so heavily, that sights are limited to 30 till 50 meters.
At the beginning of the cyclone season (from the first
of June) ‘waves’ are moderate or weak. Later
in the season, in September and October, pretty strong.
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Vacuum
cleaner
Cynically
I resemblance the behavior of a ‘tropical wave’
as the ‘vacuum cleaner principle’. Nature
has to cool down the hot seawater to prevent our world
from a catastrophe like dying corals and vaporizing
oceans. The higher the humidity and the seawater temperature
the greater the chance a cyclone will ‘vacuum clean’
the area. That is the reason while the cyclone season
on the northern hemisphere runs parallel with the summer,
with its peak during the months September and October
when the seawater temperature, the humidity and the
convection is the highest. That is also the reason why
in mid winter like in January February and March cyclones
do not exist. |
However,
nothing happens. The radiant cirrus goes up in the air
like a flying miracle. ‘Gone with the wind’.
Just like the heat and the sweat upon our faces. All
gone. The percentage of humidity drops under 90. We
go South again. This time a bit more hurried and a little
bit more focussed upon our environment. Considering
the Inmarsat-C another ‘wave’ shows up. One
that Meteo-France predicts to be at our position within
three days.