Tropical Cyclones

Tropical cyclones are one of the biggest threats to life and property even in the formative stages of their development. They include a number of different hazards that can individually cause significant impacts on life and property, such as storm surge, flooding, extreme winds, tornadoes and lighting. Tropical Cyclones: Observations and Basic Processes provides a modern observational overview of tropical cyclone structure and behavior. Organized into two sections, Part I builds a new foundation for basic understanding of tropical cyclone genesis, intensification and weakening. Part II employs the basic elements developed in Chapter 2-10 to present new appraisals of the accepted WISHE paradigm of vortex intensification, storm energetics, requirements for a quasi-steady state hurricane and more likely transient lifecycle behavior in a consistent three-dimensional flow configuration. Tropical Cyclones provides a state-of-the-art summary of the fundamentals of cyclones accessible to advanced undergraduates, graduate students and hurricane forecasters. Covers detailed appraisals of the currently accepted WISHE paradigm for tropical cyclone intensification Overviews the systematic development of the foundations of tropical cyclone dynamics and thermodynamics Includes access to companion site with animations of satellite data during highlighted tropic cyclogenesis events