Ex-Hurricane Oho Going Where Few Hurricanes Have Gone Before: Alaska-Jeff Masters

[malaise]

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=3150
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Alaska and British Columbia are on alert to receive a very unusual dose of tropical weather: the remains of Hurricane Oho, which are on track to hurtle into the Alaska Panhandle on Friday evening. Oho completed the transition from a hurricane to an extratropical storm with 70 mph winds on Thursday morning, and after short period of weakening, is expected to interact with a powerful jet stream over the Gulf of Alaska and intensify on Friday afternoon off the coast of Alaska into a powerful 960 mb low pressure system with near-hurricane-force winds and heavy rain. A High Wind Warning is up for Sitka, Alaska for sustained winds of 40 to 55 mph with gusts of 65 to 75 mph on Friday. Sustained winds of 70 mph--just below hurricane-force--accompanied by 26-foot seas are expected over the offshore waters of the Alaska Panhandle from Cape Decision to Clarence Strait. The Juneau, Alaska NWS discussion from Thursday morning noted that 2 - 4" of rain is expected on Friday from the unusual storm, and "the dry week we just had has allowed rivers to fall...but risk of mudslides cannot be ruled out due to the extreme/unusual nature of this system."


Hurricane Oho Goes Where Few Hurricanes Have Gone Before
This is the second year in a row for the extratropical remains of a Central Pacific hurricane to affect the northwestern coast of North America. As I blogged about last year, Hurricane Ana, which took an extended tour of the Hawaiian Islands, then turned northeast and maintained hurricane strength to a latitude of 36.3°N--approximately the latitude of Monterey, California--transitioned to a powerful extratropical storm that brought strong winds and heavy rain to the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia on October 28, 2014. Only one other time since 1949 have the remains of a Central Pacific hurricane directly impacted the northwest coast of North American--when the extratropical remains of an unnamed 1975 storm that maintained hurricane strength remarkably far north, to 46.8°N (the latitude of the Oregon/Washington border), hit the region.