Lysis
(User)
Thu Jul 14 2005 07:08 PM
Re: not due west...a wobble

Clark, get this:

My mom signed me up for private driving lessons a few days ago, and my instructor was ancient (I felt a little nervous driving with him). We started talking and I invariably brought up the subject of hurricanes and flying into them (I am a pilot in training). To that he responded… you don’t want to fly in one, trust me. I inquired as to why, and to my surprise, this guy was captain on one of the first B-29's to fly through the eye of a hurricane. They were instructed to circle the eyewall as scientist on board took pictures and recorded data. He talked about the downdrafts and updrafts (as you know, they couldn’t detect them back then), and how sometimes planes would come back with salt water in their engines.

I was absolutely astounded, and missed a stop sign because I was asking him so many questions.

EDIT: On your last post, I have a question about wind speed in relation to the systems forward speed. The LI express comes to mind, where the wind gusts were 180mph + despite the fact that the storm was only a category 3. Is that a product of the extremely high speed that the storm was traveling?
Hurricane Hazel in the 50’s (?) is another one.



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