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Random Chaos
Weather Analyst


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Posts: 1024
Loc: Maryland
Re: Earl and dry air
      Tue Aug 31 2010 11:06 PM

This really isn't the right forum for the question, but I'm going to try and answer it anyway.

The simple answer is: Hurricanes don't merge, as such.

Lets look at the physics of this:

1. Themodynamics: Two engines drawing from the same fuel source means that two engines will run out of fuel faster than one engine. A hurricane is an engine that runs on warm ocean waters, meaning that eventually both storms cannibalize the ability of the other storm to survive and/or strengthen.

2. Conservation of Angular Momentum: Two gears spinning the same direction (lets say clockwise for arguments sake) smack into each other. If the gears are equal size, they will both stop spinning. If one gear is smaller than the other, the larger gear will slow while the smaller gear will stop spinning. You can think of a hurricane as a giant spinning gear. When two storms near each other, the shear from the larger one will litterally rip apart the smaller storm, while the larger storm will be weakened by the shear from the smaller storm. The closer the storms are in strength, the weaker the resulting storm will be.

So what will happen if Fiona and Earl continue to be so close together? Eventually Fiona will probably fall apart and then Earl will stop feeling the negative effects of Fiona. This will in turn allow Earl will strengthen.

Many times this is described as "absorbing" or "merging" but in reality is is a result of the negative effects of the weaker storm no longer being present.

You also want to look up the Fujiwhara effect which affects the motion of storms in close proximity.

Edited by Random Chaos (Tue Aug 31 2010 11:20 PM)

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Entire topic
Subject Posted by Posted on
* Hurricane Watches up Along North Carolina Coast MikeCAdministrator Tue Aug 31 2010 11:06 PM
. * * Re: Satellite Services Division MichaelA   Wed Sep 01 2010 01:37 PM
. * * Re: RECON scottsvb   Wed Sep 01 2010 07:16 AM
. * * Re: RECON scottsvb   Wed Sep 01 2010 04:59 AM
. * * RECON danielwAdministrator   Wed Sep 01 2010 04:28 AM
. * * Re: Satellite Sevices Division Random Chaos   Wed Sep 01 2010 02:44 AM
. * * Re: Hurricane Watches up Along North Carolina Ed DunhamAdministrator   Wed Sep 01 2010 02:42 AM
. * * Re: Satellite Services Division danielwAdministrator   Wed Sep 01 2010 02:22 AM
. * * Satellite Sevices Division danielwAdministrator   Wed Sep 01 2010 02:07 AM
. * * Re: Administrative Notes MikeCAdministrator   Wed Sep 01 2010 02:04 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East Random Chaos   Wed Sep 01 2010 01:27 AM
. * * Administrative Notes Ed DunhamAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 11:13 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air Random Chaos   Tue Aug 31 2010 11:06 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air bobbutts   Tue Aug 31 2010 11:01 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air mcgowanmc   Tue Aug 31 2010 10:57 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air civil2183   Tue Aug 31 2010 10:38 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air Random Chaos   Tue Aug 31 2010 10:16 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air MichaelA   Tue Aug 31 2010 10:13 PM
. * * Re: Earl and dry air danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 10:05 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East MichaelA   Tue Aug 31 2010 09:44 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 09:10 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering bobbutts   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:51 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:41 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering Rad   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:32 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East MichaelA   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:31 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering ftlaudbob   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:29 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:12 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona and the Wave East k___g   Tue Aug 31 2010 08:03 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering bobbutts   Tue Aug 31 2010 07:55 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering Old Sailor   Tue Aug 31 2010 07:45 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering MichaelA   Tue Aug 31 2010 07:26 PM
. * * Re: Fiona steering MikeCAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 07:15 PM
. * * Fiona steering danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 06:54 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low Bloodstar   Tue Aug 31 2010 05:06 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low Storm Hunter   Tue Aug 31 2010 04:56 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 04:55 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low Wingman51   Tue Aug 31 2010 04:49 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low scottsvb   Tue Aug 31 2010 03:41 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low Joeyfl   Tue Aug 31 2010 03:40 PM
. * * Re: I'm watching Earl and what appears to be a cutoff low stormtiger   Tue Aug 31 2010 03:11 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona Random Chaos   Tue Aug 31 2010 12:39 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona danielwAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 11:57 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona Ed DunhamAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 03:02 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona craigm   Tue Aug 31 2010 02:39 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona Random Chaos   Tue Aug 31 2010 02:28 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona lordvector   Tue Aug 31 2010 02:24 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona craigm   Tue Aug 31 2010 02:14 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona Random Chaos   Tue Aug 31 2010 01:59 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona ftlaudbob   Tue Aug 31 2010 01:56 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona MikeCAdministrator   Tue Aug 31 2010 01:02 AM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona LoisCane   Mon Aug 30 2010 11:58 PM
. * * Re: Earl and Fiona WeatherNut   Mon Aug 30 2010 11:39 PM
. * * Wow! Central pressure down to 935 hPa! Raymond   Mon Aug 30 2010 11:28 PM

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