21 August 2015: Lots of activity in northern tropics

The northern hemisphere tropics are seeing plenty of cyclonic activity on this Friday 21 August 2015.

In the Atlantic basin there is Hurricane DANNY, the first hurricane and fourth-named storm of the 2015 Atlantic hurricane season,  riding ‘hurricane alley’ moving WNW in the general direction of the Virgin Island, Puerto Rico and Hispaniola beyond that. There is also a disturbance around a low pressure area in the vicinity of Bermuda, which is being investigated by the National Hurricane Center for signs of potential cyclonic development

Over the Pacific basin strong twin typhoons GONI now moving between the Philippines and Taiwan before an expected turn toward southern Japan, and ATSANI approaching southern Japan  and beginning to also turn toward the north.

Also in the Pacific there are twin tropical depressions THREE and FOUR in the vicinity of the Hawaiian Islands.

Except for DANNY and GONI none of the other active cyclones pose any danger to land for now.

Stored heat in the tropical northern oceans is quite high now, so one important contributor to cyclogenesis is present waiting for other triggers that may generate future tropical cyclones as we reach the historical peaks of hurricane seasons in these basins.

12:00 NOON UPDATE

The 11:00 A.M. National Hurricane Center (NHC) advisory brings important new information: (a) Hurricane DANNY is now a category 2 tropical cyclone in the Safir-Simpson hurricane wind scale, packing maximum sustained winds of 170 kph; (b) a new and large tropical wave is emerging over the eastern Atlantic waters south of the Cape Verde Islands, which warrants further investigation and close monitoring;  (c) Over the eastern Pacific a new low pressure disturbance off the coast of Mexico is also being investigated by the NHC.