Tracking Ernesto? Which Way Are You Going Ernesto Dear?

Tracking Ernesto..

Which way are you going and where are you going Ernesto Dear?

Everyone wants to know...

Tracking Ernesto is not an easy job and everyone is a back-seat driver it seems.

I pity the NHC right now as everyone wants info and they want it NOW!!

Take one Sunday Free and a Hurricane near Haiti and a group of weather enthusiasts or NUTS and you see people all over the Internet going whacky and bickering over direction, intensity and track.. models, speed, direction and which upper level low is really driving Ernesto.

I know I lost my temper and I rarely do that at HurrCity but everyone wants to second guess the NHC.. and I know I often have been guilty of that one but you have to go with the date that brought you (or usually anyway) and in this case... the NHC is the main player.. the star... the one that has to answer to accountability and not go offline for a few days and come back on with a new name (which some people do on the boards).

Add to that I had to take my son to a Bar Mitzvah Party from Noon to Four and there was an hour commute both ways I was stuck away from my drug of choice... my source for news... loops, laughter and best friends online on Instant Message.

What's a Mommy to do?

I dropped him off, wished them a Mazel Tov and went over to a nice little Portuguese-Italian Restaurant that had great music and even better Cappuccino made STRONG like I asked the sweet Argentinean and sat there looking at info on my sidekick.

Then... I went over to the Ocean...sat and watched the waves come in gently and grab at my toes a little as I sat half dressed just at the water's edge... on the shoreline, between water and land, between land and sea and watched the sea gulls and kids playing and... oh my gosh the colors were so bright, deep azure, turquoise, white waves, blue sky, colorful bathing suits and beach toys.. Hard to believe in 2 days time the ocean might look wild and wicked. Talked to Sharon on the Phone. Text messaged Shuky in Israel who is "following the storm" and ... got a little bit of a sunburn :) but not a lot... a little color and I can still hear the whoosh of waves in my head. Picked up a seashell for Ed and might even send it to him .. if he is accepting gifts these days.

Then, walked back over to the party, sat on a chair somewhere in the corner and talked to Shuky online about loops and sites and currents and historical storms and climo and boy does that son of mine love weather and he is so good. And, YES Shuky..if Ernesto does the Keys.. Miami will be in the NE Quadrant.. I heard you. You said it a million times.

My own thoughts? I don't like the water vapor loop. The high is being erased by moisture from the top of Ernesto. The tricky to predict upper level lows are rearranging again... and something looks like it wants to pull it up and over... The high may build in but it won't build in fast enough to save us and some model somewhere (the bam i think shows a looping storm) and... it doesn't look good. Can't put my finger on it but I think something bad is going to happen tropically speaking. And, hoping that is only a tropical storm or mild cat 1. Too many things going on here and we will see what we will see. Need a hero... an expert.

Worried that the high to its north..the very weak high is weakening. Everything is in a state of FLUX and remember that movie about Time whatever.. back to the future.. well.. could use someone like him right now.. a crazy professor type who .. OH OH I got it! We could use Dr. Gray.

One wonders what Dr. Gray would be like at forecasting and I am almost jealous of his students who got to see him in class. He is funny, he is good and he is better off camera than on (from first hand experience.. just don't step on his toes lol)

You look and you tell me what is going on:
http://weather.unisys.com/satellite/sat_wv_east_loop-12.html


Jim is doing a good job on HurrCity. Please look at the player on the front page and watch him do his broadcast. This morning he gave a "what if" scenario for what actually happened today and might happen tomorrow.

Clark on www.flhurricane.com is about as good as it gets at giving over prose.. Explaining in a calm, good manner and not talking down to people.. explaining to them in perfect discussion of what might or might not be happening. There are many over there that are very good, very, very good but everyone has their shtick, their attitude.. Clark tells it like it is and I hope he isn't upset that I am posting this here.. at the end of my post is a post from Clark at www.flhurricane.com .. go there, read yourself the blogs and the board.

And... as for www.hurricanecity.com... use some of the good links Jim has posted there but as always .. anywhere... on any site.. remember there is ONLY ONE BOTTOM LINE.. and that is the NHC... National Hurricane Center.

They are the ones who make the call.

Speaking of calls... Monroe County does not lightly issue evacuation warnings and they lose a fortune in revenue asking the tourists not to stay over another night and check out at 1pm and leave. They do so only to protect your life and limb if you are lucky enough to be partying to wickedly, delicious fruity, spiked drinks and watching the sunset.

Don't just say "oh its only the models" because the models are what separates us from the days of a Killer Cane coming at us out of nowhere.. models and satellite loops.. words and music... you can't have one without the other and if you want to go back to the days of the Seminoles who watched the Seminole Wind and watched to see the Sawgrass bend in the breeze before picking up and looking for higher ground... please... you go back in time..

I will stay here in the year 2006 where we are lucky to have the Models and the Loops... a people like Clark on flhurricane and Gianmarc and Chris and Canetrakker and Tim and LawKat and others on www.hurricanecity.com and even skeetobite to swat at lol...

Seriously, most of all we are lucky to have Bryan Norcross and............Beven and Stewart at the National Hurricane Center writing the best discussions I have seen in years.. positively inspired.

Pick your poison, pick your media... pick your favorite voice in the tropics... but watch Ernesto because despite parking his rear end over the entire island of Hispanola and dropping his winds a bit... his outflow has improved and he is looking pretty darn good for someone .. something that just took on mountain ranges of 5,000 ft and ABOVE... Ernesto is a fighter, he's the real thing.. if he was in the 50s he would make Hemingway proud.. he'd be a bullfighter... and the reds that sit on his CDO.. center are strong and clear.. so keep your eye on him and pray he stays over more high mountains and not over the warm, warm, warm waters of the Gulfstream.

This is One Big Florida Storm.. waiting to happen... hoping it won't and he will turn safely out to sea with nothing else but sending me a beautiful breeze at the beach on Monday but...... I wouldn't bet the chickee hut on it..

Be back later if I have time... after the 11pm Discussion.
Bobbi
Clark's post below.. excellent post I may add.
PS...what we don't need is another Miss Cleo.. tropically speaking :)

So...
Ernesto: What's Going On?
Posted: 12:41 PM 27 August 2006 | Edit
Early this afternoon, Hurricane Ernesto sits just southwest of the southwestern Haitian coastline, slowly moving off to the west-northwest. It continues to gradually become better organized as the shear being imparted upon it by the upper low to its west has greatly diminished over the past 24 hours, but interactions with land are serving to keep intensity in check for the time being. The big question with Ernesto isn't the current track, however, but the future track -- both short and long term.

Overnight, much of the model guidance shifted significantly to the right, highlighting the Florida Peninsula as being under the gun for an eventual impact from Ernesto. Breaking with standard operating practices, the NHC jumped on this change and wholeheartedly shifted their forecast track as of the 5a ET advisory this morning. Then, the GFS and GFDL shifted back to the west, highlighting the Florida panhandle, but now the GFS at 12z today has shifted even further to the east, suggesting a track over Miami and up the length of the peninsula. Other models continue to jump back and forth as well. Needless to say, without some sort of continuity, it's hard to pinpoint any one area as under the gun from Ernesto into next week, but current indications suggest it will be somewhere in Florida.

What is causing this uncertainty and all of these jumps? It's not from a better representation of the storm; all of the models except the GFDL maintain a very weak storm as they have throughout Ernesto's lifecycle. It stems from uncertainty in what the upper level feature currently over the intermountain west is going to do over the next few days. It also stems from uncertainty in the short-term track of Ernesto. Let's start with this latter point.

Initial projections for Ernesto had the subtropical ridge over Florida and the western Atlantic building in to the north of storm, allowing it to move on a more westerly path across the Caribbean. Problem is, Ernesto isn't south of it yet. An upper low located to its north, a feature that has been there through its history, has not weakened or moved out of the region to the east as had been forecast. This is keeping a bit of a weakness in the ridge and allowing Ernesto to move more to the northwest now, coupled perhaps with the continual reorganization of the storm that we have seen over the past few days. How this feature evolves today and tomorrow will determine whether or not Ernesto will ever fully get underneath that subtropical ridge and start to turn back more toward the west or west-northwest. Most of the model guidance does not believe that this will be the case and, given the shear zone setting up between the ridge and Ernesto, I don't either. Trough fracture has not occurred and does not appear that it will occur in a region that allows Ernesto to significantly bypass this upper low. To compound matters, this upper low is starting to serve as an evacuation mechanism for the outflow from the storm, aiding in its intensification.

What this does is places southern Florida and most of the eastern 2/3rds of Cuba at significant risk for an impact from Ernesto. While shocking at first, with more data to evaluate now as we head into the early afternoon hours, the model guidance trends and NHC track shift are starting to make a little more sense. The upper low over the north-central US is slowly progressing eastward, though is having a hard time breaking down the western extent of the subtropical ridge right now. This is projected to change, though there's not a whole lot to the west of this upper low to drive it into the ridge. Despite this, model guidance responds by creating enough of a weakness to gradually turn Ernesto to the northeast around 29-30 degrees N. This weakness isn't going to be a big one, but if Ernesto is far enough east or strong enough in the Gulf, it should feel this weakness. Question is, where is it going to be in 4 days?

A couple of scenarios can play out from here.

1: First, model guidance is accurate, with the storm continuing northwest all the way from its current location to south Florida, turning north and northeast somewhere between the eastern coast and 100 miles west of the western coast of the state. This suggests that the upper low to the north of Ernesto will keep enough of a weakness in the steering flow for the storm to track northwest now, while the upper low over the north-central US will be strong enough to force the subtropical ridge to move and/or breakdown.

2: A different scenario takes the storm further west, with Ernesto turning more toward the west-northwest over Cuba, potentially from a combination of impacts from the upper ridge over the western Atlantic as well as not as vertically deep of a storm due to continued interaction with Cuba. Also, outflow from Ernesto starts to diabatically modify its own environment, as it somewhat has already, and helps amplify that ridge despite interaction with Cuba. Historically, this scenario is not well-captured by any of the global models. The trough still comes to get Ernesto, but with only a gradual turn and acceleration and a more likely impact from Pensacola to the Big Bend.

So, which one is more likely? Only time will tell. Despite this, everyone in Florida -- and potentially further north along the southeast coastline for a rain threat -- needs to watch Ernesto closely today and tomorrow, as the situation is currently very fluid and subject to rapid change based upon the evolution of the upper pattern and the intensity of the storm. While Texas and likely Louisiana are safe from an impact as of now, I don't feel comfortable excluding Mississippi and Alabama from a potential threat as of yet given the nature of the situation. It is a situation with less confidence than normal, thus I feel those regions outside the NHC cone still need to pay attention to Ernesto at least for another day.

Residents of the Florida Keys should begin to make evacuation plans for the early morning hours tomorrow in advance of the storm. Residents of the southern half of the Peninsula should begin reviewing their hurricane preparedness plans, just in case. Residents further north along the west coast of Florida north of Tampa need to begin thinking about making preparations for a potential direct imapct from Ernesto sometime late in the workweek. Everyone else just needs to stay abreast of the situation for the time being.






Ernesto: What's Going On?
Posted: 12:41 PM 27 August 2006 | Edit
Early this afternoon, Hurricane Ernesto sits just southwest of the southwestern Haitian coastline, slowly moving off to the west-northwest. It continues to gradually become better organized as the shear being imparted upon it by the upper low to its west has greatly diminished over the past 24 hours, but interactions with land are serving to keep intensity in check for the time being. The big question with Ernesto isn't the current track, however, but the future track -- both short and long term.

Overnight, much of the model guidance shifted significantly to the right, highlighting the Florida Peninsula as being under the gun for an eventual impact from Ernesto. Breaking with standard operating practices, the NHC jumped on this change and wholeheartedly shifted their forecast track as of the 5a ET advisory this morning. Then, the GFS and GFDL shifted back to the west, highlighting the Florida panhandle, but now the GFS at 12z today has shifted even further to the east, suggesting a track over Miami and up the length of the peninsula. Other models continue to jump back and forth as well. Needless to say, without some sort of continuity, it's hard to pinpoint any one area as under the gun from Ernesto into next week, but current indications suggest it will be somewhere in Florida.

What is causing this uncertainty and all of these jumps? It's not from a better representation of the storm; all of the models except the GFDL maintain a very weak storm as they have throughout Ernesto's lifecycle. It stems from uncertainty in what the upper level feature currently over the intermountain west is going to do over the next few days. It also stems from uncertainty in the short-term track of Ernesto. Let's start with this latter point.

Initial projections for Ernesto had the subtropical ridge over Florida and the western Atlantic building in to the north of storm, allowing it to move on a more westerly path across the Caribbean. Problem is, Ernesto isn't south of it yet. An upper low located to its north, a feature that has been there through its history, has not weakened or moved out of the region to the east as had been forecast. This is keeping a bit of a weakness in the ridge and allowing Ernesto to move more to the northwest now, coupled perhaps with the continual reorganization of the storm that we have seen over the past few days. How this feature evolves today and tomorrow will determine whether or not Ernesto will ever fully get underneath that subtropical ridge and start to turn back more toward the west or west-northwest. Most of the model guidance does not believe that this will be the case and, given the shear zone setting up between the ridge and Ernesto, I don't either. Trough fracture has not occurred and does not appear that it will occur in a region that allows Ernesto to significantly bypass this upper low. To compound matters, this upper low is starting to serve as an evacuation mechanism for the outflow from the storm, aiding in its intensification.

What this does is places southern Florida and most of the eastern 2/3rds of Cuba at significant risk for an impact from Ernesto. While shocking at first, with more data to evaluate now as we head into the early afternoon hours, the model guidance trends and NHC track shift are starting to make a little more sense. The upper low over the north-central US is slowly progressing eastward, though is having a hard time breaking down the western extent of the subtropical ridge right now. This is projected to change, though there's not a whole lot to the west of this upper low to drive it into the ridge. Despite this, model guidance responds by creating enough of a weakness to gradually turn Ernesto to the northeast around 29-30 degrees N. This weakness isn't going to be a big one, but if Ernesto is far enough east or strong enough in the Gulf, it should feel this weakness. Question is, where is it going to be in 4 days?

A couple of scenarios can play out from here.

1: First, model guidance is accurate, with the storm continuing northwest all the way from its current location to south Florida, turning north and northeast somewhere between the eastern coast and 100 miles west of the western coast of the state. This suggests that the upper low to the north of Ernesto will keep enough of a weakness in the steering flow for the storm to track northwest now, while the upper low over the north-central US will be strong enough to force the subtropical ridge to move and/or breakdown.

2: A different scenario takes the storm further west, with Ernesto turning more toward the west-northwest over Cuba, potentially from a combination of impacts from the upper ridge over the western Atlantic as well as not as vertically deep of a storm due to continued interaction with Cuba. Also, outflow from Ernesto starts to diabatically modify its own environment, as it somewhat has already, and helps amplify that ridge despite interaction with Cuba. Historically, this scenario is not well-captured by any of the global models. The trough still comes to get Ernesto, but with only a gradual turn and acceleration and a more likely impact from Pensacola to the Big Bend.

So, which one is more likely? Only time will tell. Despite this, everyone in Florida -- and potentially further north along the southeast coastline for a rain threat -- needs to watch Ernesto closely today and tomorrow, as the situation is currently very fluid and subject to rapid change based upon the evolution of the upper pattern and the intensity of the storm. While Texas and likely Louisiana are safe from an impact as of now, I don't feel comfortable excluding Mississippi and Alabama from a potential threat as of yet given the nature of the situation. It is a situation with less confidence than normal, thus I feel those regions outside the NHC cone still need to pay attention to Ernesto at least for another day.

Residents of the Florida Keys should begin to make evacuation plans for the early morning hours tomorrow in advance of the storm. Residents of the southern half of the Peninsula should begin reviewing their hurricane preparedness plans, just in case. Residents further north along the west coast of Florida north of Tampa need to begin thinking about making preparations for a potential direct imapct from Ernesto sometime late in the workweek. veryone else just needs to stay abreast of the situation for the time being.