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| A tranquil Lake Istokpoga could use the waters from a few tropical storms as Florida's 5th largest lake's level hovers around 4.0-feet, barely navigable. |
The Madden-Julian Oscillation Suggests Possible Atlantic Tropical Activity in Early August
The Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) suggests that the odds of a busy period in the Atlantic will be elevated in the first half of August. Each MJO phase includes a large area of rising motion, typically accompanied by showers and thunderstorms (convection), that moves east around the global tropics over the course of 40 – 60 days.
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| Biscayne Channel Fishing at Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park |
Standard dynamical and statistical models do not extend several weeks out—and even if they did, they would not be able to predict individual hurricanes with any skill, given the inevitable chaos that emerges in day-to-day weather. However, the idea of flagging a busy period based on MJO status is not as far-fetched, since we know that a favorable MJO pattern can substantially boost the likelihood of Atlantic tropical cyclones. Climatology also favors a bump-up in activity during August, as the season is normally ramping toward its September peak by then.
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| A nearly flat sea in Naples, for sunset on a recent July evening. |
The key, of course, is whether the MJO will behave as predicted. In this case, there is a fairly strong signal in the ECMWF extended-range forecasts of MJO development in the Indian Ocean over the next few days, with the MJO impulse predicted to enter the Western Pacific around the end of July. Should this occur, the typical eastward motion of MJO phases tells us that its hurricane-friendly forward flank would enter the Eastern Pacific around the first week of August, and the Main Development Region of the Atlantic toward the second week of the month. Odds of activity over the MDR should begin to increase in association to the transition towards the convectively active phase of the MJO.
Dedicated Atlantic hurricane watchers shouldn’t turn off their attention for the next couple of weeks, though. Even if the MJO makes hurricanes more likely at particular times, it doesn’t rule them out at other times.
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| High water, sunny-day flooding, Biscayne National Park, July 2017. |
Fujiwhara Effect
Northeast Pacific is on fire
In barely more than two weeks, five named storms have emerged in the Northeast Pacific. All of them developed in an east-west belt between 12°N and 15°N latitude, well south and southwest of Mexico. This is a traditionally fertile zone for hurricane formation, but even by those historical standards, it’s been a hyperactive couple of weeks. Klotzbach noted that only once before has the period from July 7 to 23 produced as many as five named storms in the Northeast Pacific east of 140°W.
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| Early morning July 25, 2017, L-R TS Greg, TS Irwin, and Hurricane Hilary lined up across the tropical eastern Pacific. Later in the week Hilary will possibly absorb Irwin into her circulation in a rarely seen example of the Fujiwhara Effect |
All three of the current systems—Tropical Storm Greg, Tropical Storm Irwin, and Hurricane Hilary—are projected to stay well out to sea over the next five days. Greg will be moving west toward increasing wind shear and drier air, and it will likely become a depression or remnant low by Wednesday. The more interesting dynamic will be the interplay between fast-intensifying Hilary (which could be a Category 2 or 3 storm as soon as Tuesday) and more slowly strengthening Irwin (likely to be a Category 1 by Wednesday). By midweek, Hilary is predicted to move within about 800 miles of Irwin, close enough to trigger Fujiwhara interaction, the process by which two tropical cyclones close to each other take on an aspect of rotation around a point in between. Because Hilary is expected to be a stronger cyclone at that point, its upper-level outflow will likely have an increasingly negative effect on Irwin’s strength.
As for where Hilary and Irwin will be headed after midweek, that’s still an open question. It’s not every day that two Northeast Pacific hurricanes undergo this strong a Fujiwhara effect. The high-resolution HWRF and HMON hurricane models are not designed to track two simultaneous storms like this over a larger domain, and global models have been wildly divergent on the outcome. By midweek, Hilary is likely to begin shunting Irwin toward the west-southwest. However, by Saturday, the National Hurricane Center predicts that Hilary will continue to march west-northwest, while Irwin—south of Hilary by this point—begins to arc back northward in Fujiwhara fashion, perhaps eventually becoming swept into Hilary’s circulation as depicted by the 0Z Monday run of the European model. Meanwhile, the 0Z, 6Z, and 12Z runs of the GFS model are consistent in angling Hilary toward the northwest and north, with Irwin on its heels. The GFS scenario would leave the door open for a substantial surge of tropical moisture into southern California and Arizona by early next week.
We’ll need several more days to see how Hilary and Irwin evolve and how this exceptionally complex pas de deux unfolds.
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| A model-generated forecast, extending in five-day increments from July 24 to September 2, of where upward and downward motion across the tropics at the 200-mb level (about 39,000 feet) is expected to predominate. The forecast is based on a simple technique of propagating wavelike atmospheric features related to the Madden-Julian Oscillation eastward over time. Over the Atlantic tropics, sinking air (warm colors), which now predominates, is predicted to be replaced by a tendency toward rising air (green colors) during August, which would be more favorable for the development of tropical cyclones. |
Bret and Don Harbingers of an Active Hurricane Season 2017
The most dangerous hurricanes are the ones that get their start from tropical waves traversing Main Development Region (MDR), which includes the waters from the coast of Africa to Central America between 10° - 20°N, including the Caribbean Sea. Tropical waves that traverse the MDR are responsible for 85% of all major hurricanes (Category 3 and stronger). When hurricanes and tropical storms form in the MDR during June and July, it usually portends an active hurricane season, since it shows that atmospheric and oceanic conditions are primed to assist development of tropical waves that will come off the coast of Africa during the peak mid-August through mid-October portion of hurricane season. We’ve now had two tropical storms form in the tropical Atlantic before August 1: Bret and Don. This early season low-latitude activity is likely a harbinger of a more-active-than-usual Atlantic hurricane season.
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| Miami looks like an island in Biscayne Bay from about 10 miles out. |
TS Bret in June and TS Don of July were at tropical storm strength for 1.25 days each, bringing the total number of MDR Atlantic named storm days for June - July 2017 thus far to 2.5. If we look at the history of MDR named storm days before August 1 in the Atlantic, we see that 2017 now ranks in the top 20 seasons for this statistic, according to a spreadsheet provided by Colorado State University’s Dr. Phil Klotzbach (where he defines the MDR as south of 23.5°N and east of 75°W). Only a few of these top-20 MDR named storm day seasons (1861, 1867, and 2013) were quiet, when measured by Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE). It should be a wake-up call that some of the most active seasons on record appear on this list:
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In an interview at The New York Times, Mr. Bacon, 59 — good-naturedly waving to gawkers beyond a conference room window — talked about collaborating with his wife, his latest turn as a sex object and his resurrection of a long-ago role. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
In Amazon’s “I Love Dick,” you play an artist in Marfa, Tex., who unwittingly becomes the fantasy and muse for a filmmaker played by Kathryn Hahn.
I was fascinated with the idea that this man created his celebrity in this very small pond where he knew he could become the biggest fish. Most famous people have devoted their lives to acquiring that, and you don’t necessarily know how that’s going to feel until you get it, and it may not be all it’s cracked up to be. And I think Dick is at a point in his life where he’s almost sickened by the whole thing.
Are you comfortable with fame?
I always point out that it’s 99 percent good. People will smile when they see me, or they’ll tell me that they love me. That’s not the worst thing in the course of your day. New York is probably the easiest place for me to be as long as I stay away from Midtown, because if a tourist sees you then you are part of the tour.
How about with being the target of such an intense female gaze?
When it comes to the fantasy pieces of it, it’s my job. But it’s also a collaboration between where the camera is and the way that I’m dressed and the way I look, the hair and the makeup and music. Being sexy, it’s not really actable.
At one point you’re watching Kathryn and Griffin Dunne’s characters have sex.
They called me to the set, and there’s Kathryn and Griffin in their bathrobes. And then Kathryn says: “All right, hang onto your hat, pal. We’ll see you on the other side.” I sat down in my chair as Dick, and the music starts, and here come these two naked people dancing across with our cameraman, and all three of them fly into the bed. And every once in a while he pans off to see me reacting, and what I really wanted to do was laugh hysterically just because it was so [expletive] funny.
Kathryn’s character writes you lust letters. Have you ever received one in real life?
If I have, it’s been kept from me somehow.
Syfy has greenlighted a “Tremors” pilot that picks up 25 years after your 1990 film left off.
I liked the idea that [my character] Valentine McKee, this very, very ordinary man, was thrown into this extraordinary situation where he has to truly become a hero. And what happens to this guy’s life if, after that one moment, nothing is ever quite as intense? But they come back! Believe me: We’re going to have monsters.
Other reboots of “Tremors” have failed. What makes you think you can succeed?
Uhh — I’m in it?
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In Amazon’s “I Love Dick,” you play an artist in Marfa, Tex., who unwittingly becomes the fantasy and muse for a filmmaker played by Kathryn Hahn.
I was fascinated with the idea that this man created his celebrity in this very small pond where he knew he could become the biggest fish. Most famous people have devoted their lives to acquiring that, and you don’t necessarily know how that’s going to feel until you get it, and it may not be all it’s cracked up to be. And I think Dick is at a point in his life where he’s almost sickened by the whole thing.
Are you comfortable with fame?
I always point out that it’s 99 percent good. People will smile when they see me, or they’ll tell me that they love me. That’s not the worst thing in the course of your day. New York is probably the easiest place for me to be as long as I stay away from Midtown, because if a tourist sees you then you are part of the tour.
How about with being the target of such an intense female gaze?
When it comes to the fantasy pieces of it, it’s my job. But it’s also a collaboration between where the camera is and the way that I’m dressed and the way I look, the hair and the makeup and music. Being sexy, it’s not really actable.
At one point you’re watching Kathryn and Griffin Dunne’s characters have sex.
They called me to the set, and there’s Kathryn and Griffin in their bathrobes. And then Kathryn says: “All right, hang onto your hat, pal. We’ll see you on the other side.” I sat down in my chair as Dick, and the music starts, and here come these two naked people dancing across with our cameraman, and all three of them fly into the bed. And every once in a while he pans off to see me reacting, and what I really wanted to do was laugh hysterically just because it was so [expletive] funny.
Kathryn’s character writes you lust letters. Have you ever received one in real life?
If I have, it’s been kept from me somehow.
Syfy has greenlighted a “Tremors” pilot that picks up 25 years after your 1990 film left off.
I liked the idea that [my character] Valentine McKee, this very, very ordinary man, was thrown into this extraordinary situation where he has to truly become a hero. And what happens to this guy’s life if, after that one moment, nothing is ever quite as intense? But they come back! Believe me: We’re going to have monsters.
Other reboots of “Tremors” have failed. What makes you think you can succeed?
Uhh — I’m in it?
Dozens of borrowers have successfully defeated creditors in court.
Maybe you can too.
Maybe you can too.
There are countless advertisements on the internet and late-night television promising the indebted an easy way out. Just spend a few thousand bucks, and poof—that debt is gone. For some types of student loans, this too-good-to-be-true scenario has proven out: Hiring an attorney can, in certain cases, get massively indebted borrowers out from under hundreds of thousands of dollars in loans.
The reason is as simple as it is astonishing: Some creditors trying to collect on private student loans haven’t been able to prove in court that they actually own the debt in question, prompting judges to let borrowers off the hook. There are real risks, however, even if the prospect of dodging a massive debt seems tempting. Here’s a guide to how it can work—and what happens if you fight and lose.
Why Student Debt Collectors Are Vulnerable
Thousands of Americans have been sued in the past few years for allegedly defaulting on student loans owned by a group of investment vehicles known as the National Collegiate Student Loan Trusts. These 15 trusts, created from 2001 to 2007, claim to own billions of dollars in private student loans, the type made without government backing. The trusts claim to have purchased the loans from banks and other lenders shortly after the loans were made to students. When debtors miss months of required payments, collectors working for these trusts initiate court proceedings to recoup the borrowed funds.
Most of the time, the trusts are successful. A typical case might go like this: A borrower doesn’t show up to court, the trust gets a default judgment as a result, and the borrower is forced to pay off the debt—often a paycheck at a time—under a court order. For borrowers who lose these cases, the debt nightmare really begins.
But these cases can also be a way out of debt, as dozen of borrowers have found. All they needed was a bit of money to fund a legal gambit and beat back the debt collectors.
To understand why some Americans have successfully delayed or even canceled what seemed like an inevitable day of reckoning, it’s important to know that creditors generally can’t come after you unless they can prove you owe them money. The various National Collegiate trusts are having difficulty doing that, according to court records and debtors’ attorneys. (For more, read this Bloomberg Businessweek story from 2015 and a follow-up report this week in the New York Times.)
The reason has to do with the mundane business of transferring and storing paperwork—loan documents, promissory notes, and the like. When National Collegiate purchased loans from banks, it presumably had a record documenting whose loan it purchased, how much was owed, when the loan was originated, and other pertinent details.
But when it comes time for the trusts’ debt collectors to prove that ownership, facing down a delinquent borrower with legal representation in a courtroom, the records often turn out to be missing. Former students who readily acknowledge that they borrowed money from, say, Bank of America Corp. to pay for college are able to get debt-collection lawsuits dismissed by arguing that they never borrowed from a National Collegiate trust. If the trust can’t prove transfer of the loan with careful documentation, there’s no way to collect.
It’s an echo of what occurred when millions of Americans faced foreclosure proceedings in the aftermath of the financial crisis, when loan companies took paperwork shortcuts—“robosigning” is a popular term—to seize homes in what state and federal regulators say was against the law. Similar issues have cropped up in various kinds of debt-collection lawsuits, such as those involving soured credit card debt.
How to Get Out of Debt
David Addleton, an attorney in Macon, Ga., said he’s represented at least a dozen clients who were sued by various National Collegiate trusts attempting to collect on defaulted student debt. Every case was dismissed before trial.
“All they care about is getting a default judgment,” he said of National Collegiate’s debt collectors. “All you have to do is show up and defend. They always dismiss.”
Addleton charges his clients 10 percent of the face value of the debt, he said, which typically ranges from $30,000 to $60,000. Borrowers have to pay regardless of the outcome of the case.
Here’s what typically happens when attorneys representing National Collegiate sue a delinquent borrower. When the lawsuit is filed, the attorneys produce a copy of the borrower’s promissory note and documents that claim the loan was transferred from the original lender to a National Collegiate entity, according to a Bloomberg News review of court cases across a handful of states. The problem for National Collegiate is that the documents allegedly showing the transfer don’t actually state whose loans were transferred. The pages that list which loans were transferred are often blank. (Here’s an example.)
In cases filed in Ohio, Georgia, New Hampshire, and Kentucky, among other states, judges have sided with borrowers when they’re forced to rule on whether National Collegiate entities in fact own the alleged debt, because the trusts can’t show that the particular borrower’s loans were transferred to National Collegiate.
In some cases, debt collectors working for National Collegiate swear upon penalty of perjury that they’ve reviewed the underlying documentation and that it shows the targeted debtor’s loans were transferred to National Collegiate. Sometimes it works; other times, like in one California case, it doesn’t. The federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has been investigating the issue since at least 2015, agency records and court documents show. (Cognition Financial Corp., which created the National Collegiate trusts when it was called First Marblehead Corp., didn’t respond to a request for comment.)
Borrowers who successfully get the lawsuits dismissed generally can be sued again within a certain time frame established by each state. After the statute of limitations runs out, borrowers are effectively in the clear.
What Happens If You Lose
For Addleton, borrowers now have every reason to test the documentation underlying private student debt. “No one should agree to pay these people one penny,” he said.
But if you can afford to make your payments, this strategy probably isn’t for you. First, deliberately defaulting on your debt can have ruinous consequences for your credit, which can affect your ability to borrow, secure housing, or obtain a new job. Second, National Collegiate sues borrowers it thinks are in default. Why risk ruining your credit and possibly losing a lawsuit? Third, there’s a real chance you can lose if you pursue this route. A courtroom loss could stick you with National Collegiate’s legal fees, on top of the debt you’d be ordered to repay and any lawyer’s fees of your own.
It’s a gamble that can slash a student debt—or leave a litigant even deeper in the hole.