THE RETURN OF THE HALLOWEEN PERFECT STORM HURRICANE. NOREASTER? I am sure many of you especially if your weather fan has seen the movie and or read the book The Perfect Storm. To refresh your memory this storm formed in late October 1991 (also a El Nino Year) when the remains of category 1 hurricane Grace and a significant Ocean LOW that formed south of Nova Scotia became intertwined with each other because of a massive block in the jet stream over Southeastern Canada. This resulted in a whole new storm which initially was classified as a Subtropical LOW (think half nor’easter/ half Tropical Cyclone). But the system then developed “warm core” characteristics and achieved category 1 hurricane status. However for reasons that still baffle me, NHC never officially named this unusual freakish system a name for the hurricane record books Well it looks like the atmosphere is trying to do something like that again. Let me explain. A massive and powerful Trough in the jet stream is going to sweep out of the Midwest and across the East Coast on Friday. It is going to drive a very strong cold front that will reach the East Coast Saturday morning with showers or periods of rain, strong north winds and falling temperatures during the day. Suffice to say that this Saturday on the East Coast looks like in November day! But then things get interesting. IMAGE 1 Shows the 500 millibar map from the European model on the left and the corresponding surface map both valid Sunday morning. LOW pressure has formed on the front because the European model leaves a piece of energy at the base of the Trough in the Carolinas and a strong Ridge builds in rapidly across the Great Lakes and Ontario Canada. IMAGE 2 shows the European model 500mb and corresponding surface map for October 19-20. The block in the jet stream has become extensive and rather large stretching from the western Great Lakes to New Brunswick Canada. At the surface this will result in strong HIGH pressure in the Great Lakes and LOW pressure moving off the North Carolina coast very slowly. Of course, the surface LOW will be situated in the gulf stream at this time so a slow-moving system has a chance to develop tropical characteristics if it stays in the Gulf Stream for an extended period of time. IMAGE 3 Is the European surface maps valid October 23 and October 24th. Notice that the LOW pressure area in the western Atlantic Ocean is sitting in the Gulf Stream and the pressure is down to 990mb on October 23 and 984mb on October 24. Assuming this scenario is correct, and we are looking at an Ocean LOW that is deepening, a Blocking Ridge in southern Quebec, and the LOW is still in in the Gulf Stream for at least a few days. The question has to be asked is this a Subtropical Storm, a regular Ocean LOW or does it develop tropical characteristics like the perfect storm did in in late October 1991.? IMAGE 4 At midday on Wednesday only the European model was depicting this bizarre but early similar solution to the unnamed Halloween hurricane of October 30th 1991 in the Northwest Atlantic ocean. but shortly after midday the Google Deepmind weathernNext 3 model came out with a very similar solution to the European model which you can see here. Interestingly the German icon model has come out with a similar solution to the European and the Google Deepmind model but the operational GFS and the GFS ensembles still remains clueless.