Lunar cycle can turn hurricanes into monsters

Lunar cycle can turn hurricanes into monsters

www.andhranews.net

A new study has determined that hurricanes strengthen more often under a new lunar cycle than at any other time.

The moon's strange influence on Earth and its denizens is legendary. From fertility to suicide, most phenomena attributed to the Moon are almost exclusively superstition.

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But, according to a report in Discovery News, Peter Yaukey of the University of New Orleans has found what he thinks is real evidence that the phases of moon drive hurricane behavior.

Storms that occurred in the Atlantic Ocean between 1950 and 2007 were more likely to form right after the new moon.

They also intensified 49 percent more often after a new moon than at any other time in the 29.5-day lunar cycle.

Now before you jump up and say the effects of the storm will be greater due to the king tides caused by the new moon, but there is more to this story.

There are a range of possibilities.

Just as the moon pulls on Earth's oceans and creates the tides, it also tugs on the air above it. Lunar atmospheric tides are thought to be weak, but could create favorable conditions for storms to strengthen.

The moon's gravity may also pull cosmic dust into Earth's atmosphere in a cyclical fashion, perhaps seeding cloud formation and precipitation.

This supports my thoughts that it it not necessarily "global warming" causing these larger than usual hurricanes we have been seeing.

As a side note: The idea of the cosmic dust is also interesting in that it has also been identified as a factor for said GW.

www.andhranews.net
(visit the link for the full news article)

Hmmmm, very interesting news article there. I can see where they are coming from on it, but Im not sure how the moon would bring warm water up to the surface to fuel the storm.

As far as we know so far, hurricanes, cyclones and typhoons are based around ENSO, and solar heating of the water bodies.

Intriguing nonetheless, and would be interesting to see if they can get some more conclusive data from the pacific and indian ocean storms

Thanks Oz,
I was hoping you might have some insight on this. If you come accross anything, i would like to hear it.
Ant