Mediterranean tropical-like cyclone

"Medicane" redirects here. For the company, see Ziv Aviram.

Mediterranean tropical-like cyclones
Satellite imagery of Cyclone Ianos, a powerful Mediterranean tropical-like cyclone that impacted Greece on 17 September 2020.
Area of occurrenceMediterranean Sea
EffectVarious

Mediterranean tropical-like cyclones, often referred to as Mediterranean cyclones or Mediterranean hurricanes, and shortened as medicanes, are meteorological phenomena occasionally observed over the Mediterranean Sea. On a few rare occasions, some storms have been observed reaching the strength of a Category 1 hurricane, on the Saffir–Simpson scale,[1] and Cyclone Ianos in 2020 was recorded reaching Category 2 intensity.[2] The main societal hazard posed by medicanes is not usually from destructive winds, but through life-threatening torrential rains and flash floods.

The occurrence of medicanes has been described as not particularly rare.[3] Tropical-like systems were first identified in the Mediterranean basin in the 1980s, when widespread satellite coverage showing tropical-looking low pressures which formed a cyclonic eye in the center were identified.[4] Due to the dry nature of the Mediterranean region, the formation of tropical, subtropical cyclones and tropical-like cyclones is infrequent and also hard to detect, in particular with the reanalysis of past data. Depending on the search algorithms used, different long-term surveys of satellite era and pre-satellite era data came up with 67 tropical-like cyclones of tropical storm intensity or higher between 1947 and 2014,[5] and around 100 recorded tropical-like storms between 1947 and 2011.[6] More consensus exists about the long term temporal and spatial distribution of tropical-like cyclones: they form predominantly over the western and central Mediterranean Sea while the area east of Crete is almost devoid of tropical-like cyclones.[5][6] The development of tropical-like cyclones can occur year-round, with activity historically peaking between the months of September and January, while the counts for the summer months of June and July are the lowest, being within the peak dry season of the Mediterranean with stable air.[5][6][7]

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  5. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference impacts and composite was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference long-term climatology was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference what we know was invoked but never defined (see the help page).