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Eastern North Pacific Hurricane Season of 2002

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Eastern North Pacific Hurricane Season of 2002 OCTOBER 2003 FRANKLIN ET AL. 2379 Eastern North Paci®c Hurricane Season of 2002 JAMES L. FRANKLIN,LIXION A. AVILA,JOHN L. BEVEN II, MILES B. LAWRENCE,RICHARD J. PASCH, AND STACY R. STEWART Tropical Prediction Center, National Hurricane Center, NOAA/NWS, Miami, Florida (Manuscript received 21 March 2003, in ®nal form 1 April 2003) ABSTRACT The 2002 eastern North Paci®c hurricane season is summarized and the year's tropical cyclones are described. The season featured 12 named tropical storms, of which 6 became hurricanes. Five of the six hurricanes reached an intensity of 100 kt or higher. There were two landfalling cyclones, Tropical Storm Julio and Hurricane Kenna. Kenna, which made landfall near San Blas, Mexico, with winds of near 120 kt, was responsible for four deaths. 1. Overview trative example and discussion is provided by Avila et al. (2003). These diagrams reveal that the genesis of half Tropical cyclone activity in the eastern North Paci®c of the named storms in 2002 (Alma, Douglas, Elida, hurricane basin (the area north of the equator between Fausto, Genevieve, and Iselle) could be clearly identi®ed the American continents and 140 W longitude) was be- 8 with Atlantic tropical waves traceable to the west coast low average in the year 2002. There were 12 cyclones of Africa. The precursor disturbances to Kenna and Low- of at least tropical storm strength (Table 1, Fig. 1). Of ell also crossed over from the Atlantic but did not have these, six became hurricanes. The mean seasonal totals a clear signal in the eastern tropical Atlantic. In addition, for the period 1966±2002 were 15 named storms and eight hurricanes. Although the total of six hurricanes was a tropical wave likely was a contributing factor, if not below normal, there were ®ve ``major'' hurricanes, one the precursor disturbance, to the genesis of Boris. The above the long-term average [a major hurricane has max- association of Cristina and Hernan with Atlantic waves imum 1-min average winds greater than 96 kt (1 kt 5 is uncertain. Only the genesis of Julio appears to be whol- 0.5144 m s21), corresponding to category 3 or higher on ly unrelated to an Atlantic tropical wave. the Saf®r±Simpson hurricane scale (Saf®r 1973; Simpson August and September were relatively inactive 1974)]. Overall activity was fairly evenly distributed over months in 2002, as only ®ve named storms, three fewer the 15 May±30 November season, with tropical cyclones than normal, formed during this period. While sea sur- forming in each month. The longest interval without a face temperatures were at or above normal over most tropical cyclone was 25 days, from 27 September to 21 of the basin during this time, atmospheric conditions October. Kenna was the strongest hurricane of the season, appear to have been less favorable. Figure 2 shows the with peak winds of 145 kt. In addition to the 12 named monthly anomalies of 200±850-mb vertical wind shear tropical cyclones in 2002, there were four depressions for the months of August and September, calculated that did not reach tropical storm strength. using twice-daily analyses from the National Oceanic Eastern North Paci®c tropical cyclones were directly and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)/National responsible for four deaths in 2002; these resulted from Weather Service's Global Forecast System (GFS) and Hurricane Kenna, which made landfall north of Puerto long-term means from the National Centers for Envi- Vallarta, Mexico, near San Blas in late October. Tropical ronmental Prediction±National Center for Atmospheric Storm Julio also made landfall in Mexico, and rains Research (NCEP±NCAR) reanalysis project (Kistler et from Tropical Storm Boris caused damage even though al. 2001). During August, favorable (below normal) the center of the cyclone remained offshore. shear anomalies were con®ned mostly to latitudes south HovmoÈller diagrams of twice-daily satellite images can of the basin's main development belt. In September, a be extremely useful in identifying the mode of tropical broad band of enhanced shear, attributable to enhanced cyclogenesis in the eastern North Paci®c. A recent illus- low-level westerly and northwesterly ¯ow, covered nearly the entire basin. A small area of favorable anom- alies extended northward roughly along 1058±1158W Corresponding author address: James L. Franklin, Tropical Pre- during August, and in fact, two of the three cyclones diction Center, National Hurricane Center, NOAA/NWS, 11691 SW 17th Street, Miami, FL 33165-2149. that formed during the month developed in this area. E-mail: [email protected] Analyses from the NOAA Climate Prediction Center Unauthenticated | Downloaded 09/26/21 09:03 PM UTC 2380 MONTHLY WEATHER REVIEW VOLUME 131 TABLE 1. Eastern North Paci®c hurricane season statistics for 2002. Maximum Minimum sea 1-min wind level pressure No. Name Classa Datesb (kt) (mb) Direct deaths 1 Alma H 24 May±1 Jun 100 960 2 Boris TS 8±11 Jun 50 997 3 Cristina TS 9±16 Jul 55 994 4 Douglas H 20±26 Jul 90 970 5 Elida H 23±30 Jul 140 921 6 Fausto H 21 Aug±3 Sep 125 936 7 Genevieve TS 26 Aug±1 Sep 60 989 8 Hernan H 30 Aug±6 Sep 140 921 9 Iselle TS 15±20 Sep 60 990 10 Julio TS 25±26 Sep 40 1000 11 Kenna H 22±26 Oct 145 913 4 12 Lowell TS 22±31 Oct 45c 1002 a TS 5 tropical storm, wind speed 34±63 kt (17±32 m s21); H 5 hurricane, wind speed 64 kt (33 m s21) or higher. b Dates begin at 0000 UTC and include tropical and subtropical depression stages but exclude extratropical stage. c Lowell's peak intensity was attained west of 1408W longitude, in the central Paci®c hurricane basin. The maximum intensity attained by the cyclone in the eastern North Paci®c basin was 40 kt. The minimum pressure of 1002 mb was attained in both basins. (not shown) indicate that activity during the ®rst half nization. The SeaWinds scatterometer onboard the Na- of August may also have been suppressed due to the tional Aeronautics and Space Administration's Quick arrival of the negative (upper-level convergence) phase Scatterometer (QuikSCAT) satellite (Tsai et al. 2000) of the Madden±Julian oscillation. Interestingly, the At- provides surface winds over large oceanic swaths. While lantic tropical cyclone basin was unusually active during the QuikSCAT does not have the horizontal resolution August and September, generating 11 named tropical to determine a cyclone's maximum winds, it can be used cyclones, 5 more than normal. to estimate the extent of tropical storm force winds, and Section 2 describes the 2002 season's tropical cy- is often helpful in determining whether an incipient trop- clones that attained at least minimal tropical storm ical cyclone has acquired a closed surface circulation. strength (34 kt). Weaker tropical cyclones are discussed For systems posing a threat to land, in situ obser- in section 3. Section 4 presents a veri®cation of National vations are sometimes available from aircraft recon- Hurricane Center (NHC) of®cial forecasts. naissance ¯ights conducted by the 53d Weather Recon- naissance Squadron, ``Hurricane Hunters,'' of the U. S. Air Force Reserve Command (AFRC); in 2002 there 2. Storm and hurricane summaries were two such missions in Hurricane Kenna. During The individual cyclone summaries in this section are reconnaissance ¯ights, minimum sea level pressures are based on NHC's poststorm meteorological analyses. either measured by dropsondes released at the circula- These analyses result in the creation of a ``best track'' tion center or extrapolated hydrostatically from ¯ight database for each storm, consisting of 6-hourly repre- level. Surface (or very near-surface) winds in the eye- sentative estimates of the cyclone's center location, wall or maximum wind band are often measured directly maximum sustained (1-min average) surface (10 m) using Global Positioning System (GPS) dropwind- wind, and minimum sea level pressure. The life cycle sondes (Hock and Franklin 1999), but more frequently of each cyclone (corresponding to the dates given in are estimated from ¯ight-level winds using empirical Table 1) is de®ned to include the tropical or subtropical relationships derived from a 3-yr sample of GPS drop- depression stage, but does not include remnant low or windsonde data (Franklin et al. 2003). When available, extratropical stages. The tracks for the season's tropical satellite and reconnaissance data are supplemented by storms and hurricanes are shown in Fig. 1. conventional land-based surface- and upper-air obser- For most eastern North Paci®c cyclones, the primary vations, ship and buoy reports, and weather radars. (and often sole) source of information is Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) and polar- a. Hurricane Alma, 24 May±1 June orbiting weather satellite imagery, interpreted using the Dvorak (1984) technique. Several other satellite-based Alma originated from a tropical wave that moved remote sensors play an important part in the analysis of across the west coast of Africa on 8 May and reached tropical weather systems. Foremost of these is multi- the eastern North Paci®c Ocean on 18 May. On the channel passive microwave imagery, which over the following day a closed surface circulation formed along past decade has provided radarlike depictions of sys- the wave axis south of Guatemala. Over the next 5 days tems' convective structure (Hawkins et al. 2001), and the low moved slowly westward, but did not begin to is of great help in assessing system location and orga- develop signi®cantly until 20 May, when the system Unauthenticated | Downloaded 09/26/21 09:03 PM UTC OCTOBER 2003 FRANKLIN ET AL.
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