SAL

[HURRICANELONNY]

http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/tropic/real- ... split.html

The dust seems huge this year. How do you find archives of SAL from like 98 to now?

[Macrocane]

I think it's normal to have huge SAL outbreaks every now and then especially during June and July, you can't say that it's huge THIS year as there have been some weeks with little dust, it's normal to have those fluctuations.

[abajan]

Well, look on the bright side (or perhaps on the dark side, according to one’s perspective ), if there’s lots of dust around now to suppress cyclogenesis, it probably won’t be around during the traditional peak period of the season: late August through early September. Yippee!

[bvigal]

Lonny, your best record of past SAL data might be here on S2K. I'd do a search for older threads.

Meanwhile, I checked my files and found this from one year ago.

[Cainer]

I can't look for maps right now, but IIRC 2005 had above-average levels of SAL throughout the year, and as a result there were only 2 or 3 Cape Verde storms. By the time SAL makes it across the Atlantic into the Carib/GOM it's very disperse, so high SAL levels could potentially lead to more home-grown storms. Still, even years with below average SAL have huge outbreaks, and I believe that that is what we are seeing right now.

[SFLcane]

Perfectly normal to have excessive amounts of SAL across the tropical atl this time of the year. It tends to peak in july.