What is a Bomb Cyclone?

The following essay is available for re-publication in The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.

A bomb cyclone is a large, intense midlatitude storm that has low pressure at its center, weather fronts and an array of associated weather. It becomes a bomb when its central pressure decreases very quickly. The pattern's name was given by two famed meteorologists.

This tells us that a storm has access to the optimal ingredients for strength, such as high amounts of heat, humidity and rising air. Most storms don't intensify rapidly in this way. forecasters are on high alert because bombs can produce harmful impacts.

Bombogenesis is most common in the U.S. Eastern Seaboard. The storms in the midlatitudes draw their energy from large temperature contrasts. There is a thermal contrast between the cool land and the warm Gulf Stream current.

The ocean has abundant heat and humidity. As cool continental air moves overhead, the lower atmosphere becomes unstable. Clouds and precipitation form when air rises, cools and condenses.

The unstable air causes clouds to form.

Favorable conditions above the surface are required for intense storms. Jet streaks, high-amplitude waves and strong upper-level winds can help force air to rise.

Warm air rises at an increasing rate when a strong jet streak overlies a low-pressure system. The pressure can be dropped quickly at the center of the system. The winds strengthen as the pressure drops. The atmosphere is trying to make up for pressure differences between the center of the system and the area around it.

The northeastern US will be affected by a potent winter storm in January of 2022. There is a forecast for snow from coastal North Carolina northward to Maine.

Parts of coastal New England are most at risk of getting more than a few inches of snow. The storm is expected to produce storm surge, coastal flooding, wind damage and beach erosion.

Bomb cyclones are a different type of storm than winter hurricanes.

A weak low-pressure system is expected to begin the life of this storm. Global models predict that its central pressure will fall by 50 to 35 bars.

If this storm develops as forecasts predict, aided by winds blowing at over 150 miles per hour in the upper atmosphere, very warm sea surface temperatures just offshore, and a highly unstable atmosphere, it will have the critical ingredients for a bomb cyclone.

The Conversation published this article. The original article is worth a read.