Mustafa Asfur Research website

Lightning as a Precursor of Atlantic Hurricane Activity

Writing by mustafa on Monday, 14 of January , 2008 at 3:07 pm

Colin Price¹, Yoav Yair², Mustafa Asfur² 1. Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences,Tel Aviv University, Israel

2. Department of Life and Natural Sciences, The Open

University of Israel, Israel

 Abstract:

Recent years have shown the tremendous damage and loss of life that can be caused by

Atlantic Ocean hurricanes.  The majority of these hurricanes start as African Easterly Waves (AEWs) over continental

West Africa. These waves form in the African Easterly Jet (AEJ) and appear to be triggered by intense lightning activity in tropical east

Africa.  In this paper we provide evidence showing the connection between lightning activity over eastern Africa, and the AEWs that leave the west coast of

Africa, some of which develop into hurricanes.  We have analyzed the 2005 and 2006 hurricane seasons (June-September), one a very active hurricane year (2005), and the other a very quiet year (2006).  More than 90% of the tropical storms and hurricanes during these 2 years were preceded by periods of above average thunderstorm activity in eastern Africa, approximately 7 days prior to the AEWs entering the

Atlantic Ocean.  During 2006 not only was the mean east African lightning activity 23% lower than during 2005, but the lightning activity over the entire African continent was 36% lower in 2006.  We suggest the possibility that lightning activity in tropical

Africa may represent an important precursor of Atlantic hurricane formation.

Category: Articles

• Add this post to
• Del.icio.us -
• Meneame -
• Digg

No comments yet.