Atlantic Storm Watch & Coastal Flooding Events: January 2014

With the old thread locked and the faux thread fauxed, it would seem that a new thread is required for general serious :eek: discussion of the various risks of another significant event.

On consensus of five leading models, the daily timetable looks something like this:

SUN 29th DEC -- peak wind gusts 110 km/hr, borderline level 1
MON 30th DEC -- peak wind gusts 100 km/hr, sub-alert
TUE 31st DEC -- peak wind gusts 110 km/hr, borderline level 1
WED 1st JAN --- threat largely shifts south, needs to be watched
THU 2nd JAN --- most likely a waiting day with increasing winds late
FRI 3rd JAN ---- a strong signal for the first of two possible level 2 events (a)
SAT 4, SUN 5 JAN --- could remain quite or very windy
MON 6 to TUE 7 JAN --- GFS develops major windstorm, level 2/3 ??? (b)

(a) This system would develop directly from a blizzard moving southeast through the Great Lakes region merging with a coastal low on Sunday night near Cape Cod, New England. It would then move to east of Newfoundland around NYE and cross the Atlantic, in a vigorous westerly jet stream ... so far no model develops this much beyond a rather low end level 2. With the tidal peak of 1 Jan, this one has storm surge potential despite that limited degree of development.

(b) This second apparent possible major storm develops from a very strong low progged to be off the New England coast on Sat 4 Jan and moving into the south Greenland Sea during Sunday 5th, then redeveloping a centre further south that arrives over northern offshore waters between late Sunday 5th and mid-day Tuesday 7th Jan. Some model depictions currently show a windstorm quite similar to the one just ended with what would appear to me to rise to the borderline level 2 and level 3.

The other theme that is likely to be of increasing interest is a gradual cooling trend that appears to be trying to push south from the far northern Atlantic around the time storm (b) is approaching, thus introducing the prospect of a kind of Greenland Express ending to that storm. Reality may of course become more complex and require a secondary to lead in the colder air.

I'll be interested to see what others have to say about all of these prospects.