So an Expert on CNN not too long ago said that the oil on top of the water will prevent water from evaporating fueling a hurricane. On the other hand the oil being on top of the water is making the water warmer thus fueling a hurricane. And they are worried about hurricanes picking up the oil and dropping it over land.
My question:
All the oil that is being burnt down in the ocean is heating up the water. If a hurricane comes over the huge fire and oil and it starts to pick up the oil into the clouds, and goes over the gigantic fires, Could the clouds potentially catch fire?
That would put the fear of Doom in people for sure, but I doubt the clouds could catch fire. They are made of water after all. Could they suck up some oil though? Hmm… there are huge plumes of oily smoke filling the sky…
Well, the plumes of smoke are oil that is already burnt, so I doubt that will burn again. If it gets convected into the clouds it will probably come back down with the rain. Icky, BP rain.
Does evaporated petroleum lose its flammability? Hmmm… those are oil fumes, so probably not. But by the time they make it to the clouds I doubt the concentration will be high enough to ignite. I think people would be keeling over on the ground if the fumes were that powerful.
Here’s a link to some [url=]hurricane & oil spill answers.
Try2B is right, in this case, once the oil is evaporated, it is dissipated so greatly that it won’t burn. There is just too much air out there. There’s also so much moisture in hurricane clouds that nothing in them could burn.