All about Patty, a tropical storm approaching Spain.

After panic spread in Valencia and other parts of the countryDANA says goodbye to Spain, but meteorological instability will not give us a break. And Spanish meteorologists are well aware of this. Patty, A tropical storm who initially remained under observation US National Hurricane Center (NHC)but little by little he crossed the Atlantic until he reached Azoresfrom which it is planned to enter the Iberian Peninsula next Tuesday, November 5th.

As is usually the case with phenomena of this type, by the time it reaches Spain it will have lost a lot of strength. In fact, it could drop to the level subtropical storm. However, it is possible that Patty will leave heavy rainfall in parts of the west of the country.

First of all, there may be alerts in Galicia, Castile and Leon and Extremadura. The authorities and civil protection services of these regions have already been notified so that they pay attention to the development of the situation and take the necessary measures as soon as possible. DANA Valencia showed us that time is money. The same mistakes should not be repeated.

Patty’s Road to Spain

Before becoming a tropical storm, Patty remained under NHC monitoring as Invest 96L. The term “Invest” is used to refer to those tropical cyclonic systems that are at risk of becoming a tropical storm. A tropical cyclonic system is a counterclockwise rotating system of thunderclouds that forms over tropical waters.

In the very initial stages, when he does not yet have much power, he is known as tropical depression. However, you can then go to tropical storm and from there to hurricane. Therefore, when a system is classified as Invest, the danger it may pose is taken into account and more resources are allocated to monitoring it.

The code used is a number between 90 and 99 followed by a letter representing the pool in which it is formed. The letter L is used for the Atlantic Ocean, but the letter for the eastern Pacific is E, the western Pacific is W, and there are even letters for much smaller basins such as A in the Arabian Sea.

In this case, as we see, it all started in the Atlantic. November is usually not a busy month in this sense. However, this year started out rather unusually, as CNH has three systems under surveillance. While two of them remained hovering around the Florida Gulf Coast and the Caribbean Sea, the other continued its journey across the Atlantic and arrived in the Azores as Tropical Storm Patty.

If it continues on this course, it will most likely touch down in Spain between Tuesday and Wednesday. But it won’t become a hurricane, quite the contrary. Little by little it is losing power, so it is expected that it will arrive as subtropical storm.

We shouldn’t lose sight of this

DANA and tropical storms have many differences from each other. Let’s start with the fact that tropical storms, as their name suggests, form in tropical areas. On the other hand, DANAs need humid and hot air, but not so much. For example, Spain has its own main embryo in this Mediterranean.

In both cases hot water acts as fuelfor it feeds the system with that steam which maintains the pressure changes responsible for its movement. Fortunately, tropical storms usually lose strength as they move across the Atlantic towards the Iberian Peninsula. This happens precisely because the waters of the Atlantic become very cold. This is what is happening now, but with climate change the situation may worsen.

In fact, DANA is the best example of how we can understand this. They have always existed, although they used to be called cold drops. However, they were usually not as intense as the latter. Unfortunately, the waters of the Mediterranean Sea have warmed so much that in regions with large land areas washed by the sea, such as Valencia, the situation has become much more alarming.

If the Atlantic warms, the same thing could happen, but with hurricanes. It’s not the case that Patty will arrive exhausted, but we still have to take action.

Consequences of Patty in Spain

It is impossible to know exactly what will happen when Patty arrives in Spain. At the moment, they have warned that there may be heavy rainfall and large amounts of water will accumulate in some places.

As we saw with DANA in Valencia, special attention needs to be paid to places with nearby bodies of water which may overflow, such as rivers and reservoirs. The authorities are the first to act and sound the alarm as soon as possible, but the population must also be aware of the development of the situation. Something as serious as what happened in Valencia is not expected, far from it. However, we already know that we should never treat nature as a joke.