Bay of Campeche Tropical Cyclones

[South Texas Storms]

For my Tropical Meteorology course at Texas A&M University, I am required to write a 2000 word paper on any tropical topic I am interested in. I decided to write my paper on why and how do tropical cyclones develop and spin up pretty quickly in the Bay of Campeche. I think that the curvature of this region is a contributing factor. Does anyone remember some of the more quickly developing tropical systems in this area? I specifically remember Hermine and Karl from 2010 and Marco from 2008. Are there any other big ones I'm missing?

[Ntxw]

Major Hurricanes are rare in the BOC, I think Karl was the first and only one to form inside it. Probably the high terrain and how they are placed is also in the mix for fast spin ups. Roxanne back in 1995 was a cane in this region.

This is a good link, will take a lot of work scanning the seasons but worth a look. Hope it helps.

http://weather.unisys.com/hurricane/atlantic/

[Hurricanehink]

Lorenzo in 2007 intensified very rapidly in the western BoC to hurricane status, after petering out for a few days as a disturbance. 2005 had several quick developing storms and very short-lived, that might not have been classified before satellite area (esp. in some low-populated areas).

[Ptarmigan]

Major Hurricanes are rare in the BOC, I think Karl was the first and only one to form inside it. Probably the high terrain and how they are placed is also in the mix for fast spin ups. Roxanne back in 1995 was a cane in this region.

This is a good link, will take a lot of work scanning the seasons but worth a look. Hope it helps.

http://weather.unisys.com/hurricane/atlantic/

There are two that came close to Bay of Campeche.
Charlie (1951)
Hilda (1955)

Karl was quite a small hurricane. Bay of Campeche is warm, but there is dry air from Mexico that can weaken storms.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... mpeche-ber

[Hyperstorm]

Don't forget Hurricane Stan in 2005. A deadly hurricane that intensified very rapidly as it approached the coast.

[MGC]

BOC is a hotspot for TCs. Seems a lot of wave that cross the Yucatan get a circulation going over the Yucatan and once they hit the water they develop. Most head west into Mexico, but during the later part of the season some are drawn north as a trough approaches. Good luck with your studies.....MGC

[wxman57]

You might take a look at average wind shear in the region. I suspect that plays a big role. It's so far south it's generally removed from the wind shear that may impact the central to northern Gulf.

As for the funneling theory, I do know that winds associated with a cold front race down the east coast of Mexico (western BoC) extremely fast due to blockage by the mountains just inland along the Mexican coast. When this cold air reaches the SW BoC it turns eastward and forms a vortex in the BoC. So it's not necessarily the curvature of the coastline but the fact that the curved coast has relatively high terrain just inland. This might tend to concentrate the air flow over water along the perimeter of the BoC, enhancing inflow into a developing cyclone. It might take some modeling to really investigate such a theory.

[South Texas Storms]

Thanks for all of your responses!
Does anyone know of any good articles I can read on something similar to this topic?
I would like to find out and explain why the Bay of Campeche is a hot spot for tropical cyclone development.