High Sea Surface Temperatures Essential for Hurricane Production

摘要

As Hurricane Irene, the first hurricane of the 2011 Atlantic season, crossed the Atlantic Ocean, it needed fuel to sustain itself. Warm water is its main fuel and there is plenty of it in August.The map at right shows Aug. 23 sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Water temperatures typically need to be above 27.8 degrees Celsius to properly fuel tropical storms. Red, orange and yellow colors depict waters above the 27.8 degree mark, and such waters dominated the Gulf of Mexico and tropical Atlantic in late August. Warm waters also ran up the southeastern coast of the United States, following the Gulf Stream to Cape Hatteras, N.C., before giving way to slightly cooler waters (shades of blue) in the middle and north Atlantic. The warmer the water, the more intense the storm can grow, if upper-level wind patterns cooperate.