Low pressure building-June26 - Formosahut forum

It's strange to think that it was pouring rain less than a week ago and everything was saturated and muddy - now the ground is dry and as hard as concrete. The 'Big Bake' has started and the last few days we've had unrelenting heat - almost no cloud cover from sun up to sun down - and plants visibly wilting. So any sign of rain is a god sent blessing. They've got this one heading below Taiwan, but looking at the charts, i wouldn't say it was certain - does seem to be a bit of a gap for it to recurve up into Taiwan. Regardless, it should almost certainly bring some rain relief by thurs - even tomorrow night if we are lucky.

[image] [image]

According to the JTWC, the strong winds that sprang up today from the NE are not actually related to the typhoon, but they are causing the dreaded Vertical Wind Shear, which spell death to any budding typhoon. Worse, they are blocking the poleward outflow that would have brought some much needed rain relief our way.

We've gotten some good showers in DH, but it's not typhoon rain. I have a feeling we're going to get little or nothing out of this storm. The next one looks promising, but this time of year they tend to follow the path of their predecessor, so I'm not holding out much hope.

At the beach this afternoon, I noticed a lot of new wood had washed up. It appears to be stuff from Guchol that is finally making its way north.

I think the rain that we got is 'poleward outflow' from the typhoon, but not the wind, which was something else - in fact that seemed to be blocking the outflow and preventing us from getting more - according to JTWC anyway. Really, for a typhoon that close, and just to the south of us, we should have gotten a lot more.

In previous years the only rain we get here over summer is from low pressures.

Compare these two pics. The second is from a previous typhoon in a simialr position that had a strong poleward outflow.
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[image]

Excellent comparison and explanation. Having lived primarily on the west coast, I'm just starting to appreciate how these forces on this side of the island affect our weather. Your explanation also sheds light on why there are so few destructive storms this early in the year - the NE winds are still a strong influence. After July, the ITCZ, along with other weather patterns, shifts north just slightly.

I could also be just talking out of my hat. That wind was pretty weird - i'd love to talk to an expert and find out what relation if any it had to the typhoon. Was it air being sucked in or was it something completely unrelated, or even a combination? But that poleward outflow was pretty much absent this time and it is considered a key condition for typhoon development and can in itself be destructive: eg, typ Megi, which swept two buses over the edge of cliffs on the Su Hwa Highway while the typ was well south of Taiwan.

This is only the second year that i have even been aware of the position of the ITCZ so will be interested to see if it sets up in the same place throughout the season. Seems fairly similar so far?

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