This morning the National Hurricane Center increased the chance of tropical development in the Gulf to 40-percent during the next five days. Right now, model guidance is still pointing to the Wednesday night through Saturday night time frame for initial development.
From the NHC:
Tropical Weather Outlook
NWS National Hurricane Center Miami FL
800 AM EDT Sun Jul 7 2019For the North Atlantic…Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico:
1. A trough of low pressure over the southeastern United States is forecast to move southward toward the northeastern Gulf of Mexico, where a broad low pressure area will likely form in a few days. Thereafter, upper-level winds support some development of this system while it meanders near the northeastern Gulf of Mexico coast through Friday.
* Formation chance through 48 hours…low…near 0 percent.
* Formation chance through 5 days…medium…40 percent.
Model Data
Beyond Friday, though, model guidance divides on how long what ever happens out there, stays out there.
The European computer weather model keeps the system in the Gulf through late Saturday night / early Sunday morning before moving it back ashore. While the GFS computer weather model doesn’t show the system moving over the Gulf for as long.
The Canadian computer weather model (yeah, they have one, too!) isn’t historically great with tropical systems, but it recently got a decent upgrade so I took a look at what it was suggesting, too. The Canadian is showing the system sliding into the Gulf by Thursday morning, too.
All three of the computer weather models move the system – and what ever happens out there – back ashore somewhere between New Orleans, Louisiana and Tampa, Florida.
The system is stuck between two areas of high pressure. And right now, the difference between the models and where they send the system is dictated by where each model thinks the ridges of high pressure are going to be.
Remember back with Hurricane Irma? And what was steering that storm? Meteorologists had to track the tiniest of crinkles in a big Bermuda high. And those little crinkles are what dictated where Irma wen (the west side or east side of Florida).
This is a similar situation, only this time, we are playing a combo shot in pool. One ridge of high pressure is passing the system off to another ridge of high pressure.
So figuring out where this one is going is a bit more difficult at this point.
How strong will it be?
We can’t know that yet. Sadly our ability to place a storm exceeds our ability to know how strong it will be when it gets there.
What should I do now?
Check your Hurricane Preparedness Kit. That’s about it. Make sure you have enough supplies to last a few days without power and water.
Not because this system is anticipated to wipe out power and water to an area, but rather, you should always have enough supplies to last a few days without power and water during Hurricane season.
