Hurricane Harbor: UPDATED MODELS 1 AM.....Matthew Cat 4 Headed North Slowly. Watches & Warnings for FL... NHC Consistent With Cone.. Much depends on the front as does the High ... the track lies in between. NHC Cone History..

Sometimes you wait up for the models....

...then wish you hadn't.

Glad I don't work for the NHC...

Loop de loop de loop.

And lastly look how beautiful Matthew is...

...picture perfect.

Look at that distant band.

Moving very slowly...

Matthew is still a Cat 4 Hurricane as of 11 PM Tuesday evening. After making a brief landfall in Haiti and Cuba it retains Cat 4 status. Note while it's landfall may have been brief over Haiti a good part of it's circulation was over land and there was heavy flooding and we will see in the morning how exactly Haiti fared as early reports are always wanting...

That is the Cone at 11 PM.

If you are inside that cone... pay attention.

IF you have a colored warning ...

..including Tropical Storm Warning SW of Cone.

Pay Attention.

Note the cone can verify at any point in the cone.

Example:

And should something change big time...

...the NHC will nudge the cone left or right.

Suddenly you are in the cone or out of the cone.

Until it is way past you pay close attention.

Andrew bobbled South during the night.

Yes, Homestead was in the cone.

Yet every one was given the impression...

...was the Miami Dade - Broward Line.

The NHC said watch the cone.

Charley made landfall within the cone.

On the edge of the cone and ....

....the cone was moved in real time.

I think I have made my point.

Now let's look at the Water Vapor Loop and note how the front is moving in from the West with a reinforcing front behind it. The High is moving West but a bit slower as newly formed Nicole may take a repetitive small nibbles out of the High Pressure. The cone is in the middle between the two. Should the front speed up in the short term Matthew could lunge further towards a landfall in Florida and if the High erodes some it may stay further off shore. It is a wide system with strong winds over a wide area even though the strongest winds are in a narrow eye wall area. That means you may experience a long period of Tropical Storm force winds for a long period of time if it is moving slowly just off shore in Florida.

See the dry air moving slowly East in the GOM?

See the High pressure ridge holding tight.

Nicole the smaller storm on the right.

How that interaction plays out over night..

Show the future of Matthew and it's track.

Look at the reinforcing system to the West

Broward County Florida is in a Hurricane Warning.

Miami Dade has a Tropical Storm Warning.

I want to point out a few things tonight and the most important of all is that for days now the NHC has been spot on with regard to it's long term cone. Other than Jamaica not being impacted the long term cone has always shown a cone progressing closer and closer to Florida and the Carolinas. A good part of that cone is always over the Atlantic Ocean, a part moved closer over land. As always the NHC likes to remind you not to look at the middle of the cone, yet I saw two mets in NC on the air only referring to the center line of the cone. One in particular an old timer who loves to play down hurricanes and snow storms and is extremely conservative pointed to the center line in the cone as being moved further to the right with regard to North Carolina implying we have little to worry about. The NHC says repeatedly NOT TO LOOK AT THE CENTER OF THE CONE. Their forecast is for the whole cone not any one part within that approximate cone on that given day. So keep that in mind whether you listen to someone who loves to root on the storms or who likes to wish them away. I won't tell you how you can Google or Youtube the met in NC who sort of shrugged when Raleigh got a wild Ice Storm or Snow Storm as "oh well ..."

Timing and intensity is not always 100%

The Track has been pretty spot on.

Note previous cones:

Down when Matthew was bouncing along South America...

They brought Matthew up over Cuba/Haiti..

..towards Bahamas near Florida.

Jamaica got luck on the edge but near the solid line.

The cone got narrower.

The area in Haiti where it made landfall was in the cone.

As was the area affected by Matthew in Cuba.

Note on the 5th Day it touched Florida.

The area it touched now has a Hurricane Warning.

Doesn't get much better than this...

It's not about the center line.

It's about the cone.

Next cone:

The wide NRL cone.

All the ships at sea cone...

Note how perfectly this cone verified.

Point for point.

The NRL Cone has wind fields put in there.

IF the cone continued to verify would be a win for Florida.

Old cone. Something changed.

Showing you the progression of cones and forecasts.

Note the changes below.

Tonight's NRL map:

The track has pulled closer to the Florida Coast.

It is within the shaded area of the previous cone.

Again look how much is over open water..

How much is over West Florida, Georgia.. Virgnia.

They keep refining the cone.

The solid line on the NRL map.

And that is what the NHC does... they refine the cone.

Define it over and over with new info in real time.

The 3 Day Cone is more set in stone.

Narrow and reliable.

The slightest wobble West brings the solid line on shore.

But it is about the cone.

It's human nature to watch the solid line.

Canadian Map mirrors the NHC

Note until it gets to say just East of Miami..

..it moves slowly.

Then it moves faster.

That's the feel of the front.

Everyone hoping Nicole erodes the High..

Understand this is also about the front.

The dry air behind the front.

How strong the front is changes everything.

Check back tomorrow . . .

Larry Cosgrove who I do respect. Has been concerned for days that Matthew would merge with the front. For Miami people think Wilma and how we had cooler air after the hurricane past because the front went through. This is common for October systems. Also when that happens the weather spreads out over a wider area even though it is no longer a Cat 4 Hurricane. This is way down the line but something to think on. You can friend Larry on Facebook and sign up for his emails. His discussion is good for people who live "up north" and keep asking me about Virginia and the rest of the East Coast.

https://www.facebook.com/larry.cosgrove

His is one view of many and he updates in real time as needed.

This is what he said tonight.

NHC Discussion says this regarding the "fronts"

You can also sign up for alerts for Mike's Weather Page for when he goes live. He draws about 1,000 people often and he responds to questions. And you can go and watch older videos as they are uploaded if you missed one. https://www.facebook.com/mikesweatherpage/

Bottom Line Tonight.

Watches and Warnings.