Anxieties Mount as Weather Forecasters Fail to Ascertain Movement of Brewing Cyclone Sandra
Would-be tropical Cyclone Sandra, currently brewing and packing in strength off the Queensland coast, has elevated the anxieties of weather forecasters monitoring because they can't seem to figure out the movement of the state's second cyclone of the season.
This as Australia's weather guidance systems showed Sandra has at least six trajectories to choose from.
The developing cyclone, as of 6am Thursday, was spotted 820km east-northeast of Townsville. Weather forecasters from the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) believed the cyclone would remain in the Coral Sea at least until the weekend.
But they could not ascertain what could possibly happen after that. "The longer term forecast still has a bit of uncertainty to it," David Grant, BoM forecaster, said.
A spokeman from Australia's Early Warning Network corroborated the findings and anxieties from the BoM experts.
''A tropical cyclone should develop later today or overnight and head away from the coast over the next three days,'' an unidentified spokesman for The Early Warning Network (EWN) was quoted by the Sydney Morning Herald.
''What's not certain is where it heads from day four and onwards."
''At this stage there is little confidence in any model outcome from day four onwards as none of them are showing any agreement.''
Cyclones formed off the Coral Sea, according to Pradeep Singh, another weather bureau forecaster, do manifest erratic patterns.
"Some behave," he told Adelaide Now. "Yasi did. It had a reasonably consistent track but some you see have really erratic paths."
"They do all sorts of things. They go north, go south, do loops and this one might live up to the reputation."
Kerry Plowright, EWN manager, said they hoped to come up with a more feasible projection for Cyclone Sandra's path over the next 48 to 72 hours.
"I hope it doesn't come this way. We've had enough."
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