UPDATED!! TS Don Weaker - Invest 96L Forms. Track for 96L goes to the NW. Don Keeps Heading West. Possible Candidate for Rapid Intensification So Bears Watching.

11 AM Advisory finds Don not doing so good.

Down to 40 MPH winds.

Losing the battle with shear.

Again look at the left side of the loop above.

You see the clouds caught up in the strong Shear.

That's the shear that's doing battle with Don.

Shear is winning.

Which looks really good for Euro that wasn't a believer.

Unless Don can fight off that shear...

...and that's doubtful.

He will unravel in the same way Bret did last month.

Prime time in E Carib for shear this time of year.

Later in Hurricane Season the Carib is friendlier.

NHC sent recon in and they had problems finding a closed center in Don. They discussed this in the 11 AM package but are going with the premise that there is a small closed center there until they are sure it has opened up into a strong wave. There is some strong weather in "Don" and it may in fact still be Don or Don may be done. Time will tell. The NHC cut it's cone back, no double dipping for Tropical Storm Don. He's on borrowed time. Worth remembering which models forecast this vs the ones that made it a strong hurricane. And that is in fact why the NHC tries to be conservative with changes to it's forecast package. It's always best to wait a while to see for sure what will or what won't verify. 

If Don does not intensify..

..and comes in as weak TS or TD.

Don may track along the lower part of the cone.

Trinidad could get some stronger weather.

Lower part of islands should keep an eye on it.

Stay tuned to this ongoing drama.

And when we are done with Don.

Hilary is the next name up in the Epac.

Karma somewhere is having fun today.

So keep watching.

As for Invest 96L I'm watching it.

We are all watching it.

There's time.

SAL is ruling the roost in the Atlantic.

96L may form.

For now it's an elongated area of convection and low pressure.

 I still like the wave currently over Africa.

A real wave train going on.

And soon MJO moves into our part of the world.

Currently the MJO is in the Epac.

Have a good day.

The world is fine. 

I just snipped that badly. 

Sorry...

I had sushi for lunch.

I'm a happy camper.

Be back later with more updates.

Keep watching the drama.

Nice flare up again in the BOC... 

Heavy storms in South Florida today.

Below is discussion from this morning. You can see how fast things change in the tropics. So many models, so many possible solutions and things develop in real time. AGAIN small systems can spin up FAST and they can FALL APART in real time. Go to the movies and you might miss the drama in the tropics. And as fast as it fell apart earlier it can ramp back up just as fast! Stay tuned...

                                                                 * * *

Rise and shine as they say.

We do that early on busy tropical days.

Note TS Don approaching the Islands.

Invest 96L to it's east.

Nicely spaced.

5 AM 

11.5 N 56.2 W

W at 18 MPH

Winds 50 MPH

1007 Minimum Pressure

Cone from 5 AM

Only real change is they extended Don's predicted life span.

We are now looking at Thursday dissipation.

That can change so stay tuned.

As the sun rises over Tropical Storm Don....

You can see it's structure and its small size.

Over night it bulked up some.

You can see this below.

Steady as he goes.

Intensifying.

Track from NRL site.

And for comparison below is a hurricane.

HURRICANE FERNANDA in Epac

105 MPH.

Headed to Hawaii.

Will weaken before there..

Don above is NOT a Hurricane.

So I want to be serious this morning in that there are a lot of extremely predictable Hurricane Don jokes online right now. Some are quite funny ... witty.. no matter what your political persuasion it's good to laugh sometimes. But, many people just read Hashtags and headlines and get all excited and nervous that their Aunt Tillie vacationing in Trinidad is going to deal with a Hurricane. So if we can just keep this in perspective a bit and if Don becomes a hurricane (and that is possible) we can use the hashtag and make jokes. However, from a forecasting point of view this is not a joke as we have a small, but strong tropical storm going into the Islands on what possibly may be an intensifying phase. Some island, some where to quote a song ...is going to get a strong fast, punch from Don. And, the NHC center didn't make fun of Don's size ... Don is small. Just the way it goes. They have been way more critical of the size of many other strong hurricanes that the satellite imagery had problems even finding. I don't want to be a Debbie Downer here but if you type in #HUR this comes up ... and no it is not NOW a Hurricane.

How could it become a hurricane? Because with regard to Don in particular size is a problem as small storms are more prone to ramping up fast the way a small sports car revs it's engines and can make faster moves and turns than a large 18 wheeler on the highway. Speaking of large messy areas of convection slowly coming together is Don's friend Invest 96L introduced over night on NRL. A larger system and one that is expected to pull more to the North. 96L is orange and has a 40% chance of forming. 96L has a well defined low pressure system attached and models are being run and it is being studied. 

The fly in the ointment with Don is that some models do stick with solutions that show Don intensifying rapidly on approach to the Islands and attaining Hurricane strength. Other models do not show that and the NHC is trying to walk a conservative line while mentioning the other models.  So let's look at those models and discussion from the NHC at 5 AM.

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATCDAT5+shtml/180834.shtml?

That is an excellently written discussion explaining what is going on in Don's developing CDO way better than I can and no arguments on my end. The last paragraph is the kicker and the part I am posting in case you don't read the discussion for yourself.

And on Twitter there has been much discussion on that possibility. For now I'm going to go with we watch just what Tropical Storm Don does today and after getting better information to put into the next model run see what we shall see. The main point here is if you are in the path of Don watch and prepare for a Tropical Storm but know that a hurricane over Grenada is not out of the question. And there are several possible islands to experience a hit from Don so stay on top of late breaking information. And, no joke stay away from #Fakenews regarding Don as joking around is one thing but I've seen fake cones up online with Hurricane Don headed straight for WPB and no it's not doing that. I don't want some sweet abuelita in Little Havana having to rush to the ER for a panic attack because she read Hurricane Don is headed her way. Seriously... Now if you want to wonder if anything remains from possible Tropical Storm Emily that could form from Invest 96L coming further to the North... that we can discuss later. 

Again above is an older post.

It shows the possibilities that exist regarding strengthening.

And again that is up to Don.

Warm water, low shear.

Current models on Intensity.

Now you see how hard it is to work at the NHC...

Mike has all the models up on www.spaghettimodels.com and his Facebook Page. The images are from Levi Cowan from www.tropicaltidbits.com and posted to Spaghetti Models and elsewhere.

https://www.facebook.com/mikesweatherpage

Join the discussion on Facebook...

..or on Twitter @tropicalupdates

If you want to watch the Don as it relates to any possible rapid intensification one of the two best tools we have are the Funktop all colorful and the Dvorak that shows the story in shades of gray. Bright white inside the black is a sign of strength, not a black and white donut ;)  If you see green develop inside the red on funktop watch it carefully! Funktop is the view at the top of the page.

Wide view:

I'll be updating at the top of the page with new advisories.

I'll put up a new post if something big happens.

I'll update either way later today.

So check back often.

Have a great day... 

.. enjoy the jokes but keep them in perspective.

Besos BobbiStorm

@bobbistorm on Twitter

Here's a touch of home town humor.

Keep watching what may be Emily... 

..it's a busy season.

Do you have your hurricane supplies now?