[Porsche-O-Phile]

Ike is crazy - how does something go from a tropical storm to a Cat IV in less than 18 hours?

There's a LOT of oceanic heat content this year, one reason the convection in these storms is so explosive this year. The things that will protect us are (1) steering currents and (2) shear. Hanna is sort of a non-issue because it's getting sheared apart. It won't amount to much. Josephine (way out in the Atlantic) is similarly getting sheared apart. That one probably won't be much of anything unless whatever's left of it by the time the shear lets up can re-organize. Ike is even supposed to encounter strong (30+ knot) shear in about 36 hours. I suspect even that storm is going to get torn apart by it.

If there's a storm that pops up in a low-shear environment though, watch out - those are the ones that are going to do major damage. Doesn't look like anytime soon in the Atlantic though - lots of ridges & troughs interacting around the periphery of the "typical" hurricane zone - meaning lots of shear and steering currents that are prone to doing weird things rather than just letting systems drift on the trade winds across the Atlantic into the coastal U.S.