Hurricane Harbor

A writer and a tropical muse. A funky Lubavitcher who enjoys watching the weather, hurricanes, listening to music while enjoying life with a sense of humor and trying to make sense of it all!

Thursday, July 11, 2019

UPDATED! 5 PM BARRY FORMS & 93L Forms Yellow Invest Off Africa ...Barry Reminding Me of His Great Ancestor Uncle Earl 1998 - Back to School. Shear Exists, Dry Air Places. Hot Water. Barry Needs a Good Stacked Center.

5 PM Update.
Hurricane warnings up in case it becomes a hurricane.


Note barometric pressure went down.
Usually wind speed follows and goes up.
Stay tuned.

Compare and contrast.
Not much changed.
TS Barry moved .3 degrees West.
That's slow movement.
Maybe slower than 5 MPH 
NHC advisory is "forecast" movement.

Below you see cones next to each other.
Very similar.

Short term movement same.
Mid term a smidgen to the right.
Seems to cut right a drop faster on the 5 PM


11 AM on left. New Cone 5 PM on right.

You can now see Barry from outer space.
I'd venture to say he might be a drop stronger than advisory package.


You can make it out.
A few hours ago you could not make it out without enlarging.
Shown below a much nicer signature than it has had so far.


I'll update with model discussion in a bit.

They have posted a Storm Surge Warning for Lake Ponchatrain.
If you have never been on that lake it's awesome.
From the bridge in the middle you cannot see the sides.
It's as if you are out in the ocean.
It's huge. Communities along it's North rim may have issues.
A Hurricane Warning was issued.
It says in discussion in case it becomes a Hurricane.
They have low confidence but err on the side of caution.
Good idea.


Some excellent discussion on www.flhurricane.com for old school types.

Be back in a bit.

***

1 PM from NHC



Barry consolidating his strength.
Moving slow.
A day for working on himself.....
...while those in his path prepare accordingly.

In the Atlantic 93L is small but spinning some.
Yelp reviews from NHC aren't good.
But maybe it might surprise us.

Just the fact that it's on the board on July 11 is surprising.
Again treat July as if it's August this year.


Satellite imagery shows Barry in the GOM
Waves making their way across the Atlantic
93L out there, small but noticeable.



I'll do a full update after the 5 PM package from the NHC
And I will go over model discussion then.

Stay tuned....
Discussion below that's timely if you haven't already read it.
Thanks... took the day off a bit to take care of somethings.
And not watch the pot in the GOM too closely so it will boil.

Let's see what Barry can do to pull it together today.



Busy day at the NHC.
Invest 93L has now been introduced.
MDR Tropical Wave.
Tropical Storm Barry
Finally forms :)



https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/sat/satlooper.php?region=93L&product=vis


Note compare and contrast this with discussion below on Earl 98

Note changes to watches and warnings.
Watch the trend to the East.



My Bottom Line on Barry is this...
Prepare if you are told to...
Watch carefully to go into action...
...if you end up later in the area warned.

Watch Barry pull himself together today.
Today is the day....
Shear is still there but hey...
..if not now when?
As I said below I think he will ramp up when he smells land.
Smells land AGAIN.
He came off of land...remember that.

And as for the Atlantic.
Do NOT go by the Calendar.
This July is more like August.
And waves will start to become storms.
Early storms may not go the distance....
....but later storms will make landfall somewhere.

Not all waves but this is a year to worry more.
Huge high.
Strong waves.

So now onto 93L
Could it become Chantal?
Maybe... briefly? 
Time will tell.
It had my attention last night.
Today is has the NHC attention.

In other news, NHC has declared a new invest in the #Atlantic MDR. GOES16 VIS does show a broad area of low-level circulation associated with this tropical wave. The thing to watch will be how strong will the SAL hold over the E'rn Caribbean. #Tropics #93L #Invest93L pic.twitter.com/OOpAvbepIK



Told you not to forget about those strong tropical waves.

More breaking news....
Barry has competition ....




As I said yesterday...
While watching Barry come together 
Do not ignore those African Waves.
Showed this last night.
The wave looked better than Barry.


10% currently. May go up to 20% at least.
Keep watching.
Just to be there July 11th is a statement.



Wave by African last night.


Barry last night.


Okay... more on the wave later.
Barry today... maybe.

Barry and the Yellow Circle near Africa.



gom_ir4_sat_tropicalindex_anim.gif (640×480)

Still not a hurricane.
There may be some back pedaling from the NHC today.
They have already lowered their expectations.
Tropical Storm Barry end game for now.
Note moisture is everywhere.
Water is warm.
Shear is there too.
The center is trying to form.
Winds up to 35 MPH at 8 AM.



Messy.... such a messy presentation.
B for potential and D for presentation.


Models



Okay let's go back to school today.




Now let's look at Earl from 1998
Earl was an ugly sort of storm.
I don't mean MEAN BADASS UGLY
I mean so ugly... poorly formed.
As in "you got to be kidding me"
As it took a long time to form.
It hooked a right.
We are not expecting that for Barry.
But it's been a similar progress...


As a Cat 2 shown below...
You can see why people asked
"you got to be kidding me"


Yeah the eye was always hard to see...

This is a sample of discussion.
EARL 1998


Link to EARL 1998 Discussion

https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/dis/NAL0598.006

Again a quote

"Earl does not have much of a signature at that level . ..
suggesting a rather shallow system that 
may not respond to deeper layer steering"

Note as people are walking by their shirts are not rippling.
"lashing the Florida Panhandle"
Yeah... rain, flooding.
Much of the weather was to the East.

Earl, bless his little center, always looked Extratropical...
...before it went that way.


"don't get me wrong it's swirling"
"not near as bad as it could have been" 

Rainmaker. Up to 17 inches... 

"winds are picking up now...
...probably gusting on the order of 40 or 50 mph...
...surf is holding it's own"

From day one to me Barry reminded me of Earl.
Not in track.... close... but in structure and formation.

Listen it is what it is...
..and it ain't pretty.
But Barry will soon be upgraded to something.
As per NHC discussion and forecast.

The water is warm.
There IS shear... I saw the shear.
I'm not sure why it was discounted.
I go by the water vapor more than models.
I look to see if models verify with the WV.
Always see if models connect to the set up.
Models are suggestions....
...changing slightly on each run.
They are helpful, useful but they don't direct the storm.
They suggest where the storm will go.
They try hard God Bless their algorithms.

So back to Barry.....


For picayune people please read the NHC disclaimer


Always read the small print.

Same track.
As I said previously slow movement in the short term.
Then it feels the weakness and the opening...
The front between the high pressure influences.

https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/

Levi Cowan explains this well around 5 minutes in...


Speaking of competing steering flow let's go back a bit...
...to an image I put up showing PTC2 trapped.


 Why hasn't Barry become Barry earlier you ask rather than later? First off there was shear that was extremely noticeable on the water vapor loop. Yes the water beneath the system is very warm, however it helps to have a good structure and for all centers found to be stacked vertically. The much feared Major Hurricane Debby fell apart because it's centers never aligned, it was tilted and basically fell over before it got to destroy Miami as predicted by many models. Yes models were crummier then but back then everyone thought the models were the bomb and Debby would bomb (we said bomb a lot then) and well she blew apart as if she had been bombed.  Let's see what happens once Barry pulls it together and what track it takes and if it finds an opening in the highs to the North, how strong the front is and where we are Friday  morning. I will update later today but not holding my breath. Going shopping.


Forecast above.
They began evacuating the Florida Keys.
Dangerous Debby.....

Then......
... Debby was no mas (no more)


So it's that simple.
Without a center stacked right.
The air cannot evacuate properly.
It is more susceptible to shear...

Think of a building under construction.
If a fire starts in a building under construction.
The fire rages and destroys the structure.

This happened a while back in Raleigh.
The building was not near finished ...
.... fire raged, building destroyed.
Shell left.
Bad, very bad.


A Cat 3 is impacted by shear.
Shear stops a mediocre system from forming.
Or it delays it.

That's it.

Winds are up to 35 MPH.
NHC will upgrade it.
It may or may not make hurricane.
We have to see what is under the hood.
Tropical systems do surprise at landfall.
Sometimes the surprise is "OH MY GOD"
Other times the surprise is .. "o my God... meh"

Barry was a Land Cane before it was a tropical system.
It did it's best as it came off shore.
Possibly Barry will do it's best when it sniffs land again.

I'll update later this afternoon.
Have a great day.
I'm going shopping... 
No not for hurricane supplies.
For presents for Miami kids.
For make up (duh)
Maybe cute sandals or heels.
Got places to go next week....
...people to see.

Besos BobbiStorm
@bobbistorm on Twitter and Instagram


(lol sorry that's how I felt watching PTC2 yesterday)

I was teasing ....

Yes Barry has HOT WATER...
What was does it really got..

Bonus round for those who got down to the end :)
Not sure why the NRL has this graphic up.
NRL tends to run a step ahead of NHC
Mercury Retrograde maybe?



Time will tell.
A song for a friend... kind of







Labels: , , , , , , ,

posted by BobbiStorm @ 6:11 AM 1 comments

Thursday, August 30, 2018

Updated! CARIBBEAN GETS A YELLOW CIRCLE. NORMAN IN PACIFIC GOES MAJOR IN A BIG WAY. PTC6 Forms. Potential Tropical Storm. Forecast to be a TS in 24 Hrs or Less, Hurricane Down the Road. Name Will Be Florence. Tropical Wave Closer to SE Coast Being Watched. More Updates Later Today.

7 PM Update.
Things worth thinking on.


The X is where the area is currently.
The circle is where it is expected to form.
Remember this is a forecast it's not set in stone.
Expected is the key word.
Anywhere in that bigger circle.



The long awaited yellow circle in the Carib is here.
So now what? 
We watch it.
Again it will go where there is low pressure.
It will stay away from high pressure.
If shear is weak, it develops more.

Let us look at the two pictures below.


Picasso couldn't do better than Mother Nature.
Note the large area of convection in the GOM
Near where the current yellow circle is....
...note the large wave bottom right.
It has a look the wave... just saying.
I wouldn't be surprised if it develops.
Again note the closeness of the convection to it's NW.


There is a high aloft.
It only has one place to go.
High pressure to the North.
It goes WNW towards the Low Pressure.


I'm not saying it's super low pressure there now..
(Jim... talking comparatively, where there's convection... 
... the pressures are lower than to the North)

So keep watching.
Note there are already heavy rains in PR.


You don't need a name to get dangerous amounts of rain.



Note everyone's watching the shear charts.
As lowered shear will tell much of the story.



Now as for PTC6 
(almost rhymes...
PEE TEE CEE 6 ..see?)


To be clear what a PTC6 is I've shown Phil's post.
Phil is a friend. He is a good man.
A very good meteorologist.
Good explanation....
..as it can be confusing.

Now why am I talking about Norman?
I say all the time the Pacific is not my ocean...
It's a good lesson in how fast things can change.

Norman was expected to develop some...
But nowhere near as strong as it is..
Note the following discussion.

Yesterday... 
Expected to top out at 125 MPH.
Your regular run of the mill discussion.

Later Wednesday.
SHIPS model mentioned.
Rapid Intensification very high.
Talk on the ridge, direction, etc.
Expected to top out at 130 MPH.



Tonight.
150 MPH.
20 MPH more than forecast.



Now they are forecasting 155 MPH...
How high can it go?





My goodness.


I don't really mean to be sarcastic.
I mean to educate that hurricanes are unpredictable.
Even in today's age with good modeling.
Luckily Norman isn't threatening land.

Now replace Norman with the Labor Day Hurricane.
Wilma when she exploded... 
Katrina in the GOM

Never believe a forecast 100%
In the 24 hour it's solid.
3 Day forecast is very good usually.
5 Day is often good.
But when someone tells you:

"It's a fish storm"
"Stick a fork in it.. it's all over"

Do not believe it until you see it.
The NHC corrects in real time ...
...responding to what the storm does.
Models correct to reality as well.

If a hurricane is out there somewhere near you...
...or way to the South of you or SE..
Watch it.
If a strong tropical wave is forecast to develop some..
... pay attention.
Check back often.
Andrew was supposed to catch the trof to the Carolinas.
Andrew was supposed to die and was on life support.
Then something changed.
Remember that.

I'll update as needed.
If you haven't read this earlier...
...continue reading.
If not... 
Sweet Tropical Dreams.

* * *













Guess we can call today a day of Live Blogging. Not making a new post for a Potential Tropical Cyclone though the name is a good call as it's still crawling off the coast of Africa as seen below on images I've posted. Forecast discussion shows their solid belief that this becomes the 3rd Hurricane of the 2018 Hurricane Season (if you are keeping track) so not such a slow season number wise even if many were Subtropical Storms or short lived storms.


Kind of an "in abundance of caution"
They need to designate it to put up watches and warnings.
Government agencies have rules you know.
Rules are often good to have.
Guidelines.


Something I want you to think on as in "notice" in that it is a common signature as the tropics heat up. You can see where our undeveloped Tropical Wave in the Caribbean is on a thin leash of moisture to the ITCZ in the Atlantic that goes all the way back to what will be Florence. This is how storms connect and stay alive. They need moisture. Often there is a hand off of energy from one area to the other as the tropical waves progress West. Note how it sucks up the "orange energy" from the ITCZ in the MDR (Main Development Region of the Atlantic) and then starts to suck up energy from moisture down near South America. http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/real-time/mimic-tpw/natl/anim/latest72hrs.gif



latest72hrs.gif (947×405)

The link is above if this doesn't work well.
You never know with this site so posting the link as well.

Stay tuned.
More updates later as information is updated.

From earlier today.
Note the discussion on the Tropical Wave in the Carib below.
And it's something to watch.
NWS New Orleans is watching it.

https://forecast.weather.gov/product.php?site=NWS&product=AFD&issuedby=LIX



DaBuh posted it earlier today.
He's good.
He knows where to look ....
...especially when it comes to waves.
(he's a surfer... it's a joke....smile)


Miami NWS is watching it also.
You don't need a yellow circle from the NHC..
...to know something's out there.
See Miami discussion below.
NOT in the Long Term though.


Let's call it the Labor Day Tropical Wave for now.

* * *
We went from a wave to PTC6 in hours ...
...after it rolled off of Africa.
How bout those water temps now?



We are heading into tropical trouble now.
September Remember


All the basics are up on Spaghetti Models.


Models in the short term show a Fish Storm.
F for Florence the Fish Storm.
But down the road things might change.
Is the strong high really opening up wide?
Could it snap back shut?
We will know soon enough.

NRL has the page up but few images yet.
We have just begun studying it.


That will change.



Well that's a done deal. You can see the circulation tightly wound up below. Watches and warnings will need to be hoisted it seems for the Cabo Verde Islands. Expect a Tropical Depression to form soon from the short lived Invest 90L that is being studied. I'll update this later today as watches and warnings are posted and there is more actual discussion on Invest 90L that will become Florence it seems soon. Doubtful the tropical wave in the Caribbean could develop that fast to steal that name from what is already a done deal.


https://earth.nullschool.net
Mike has the link always on his site.
Great produce.

www.spaghettimodels.com

You don't have to ask why they need to put out a package.
Often the CV Islands are the first to see the storm.


The product above tells the story.
The story's name is Florence.
You can see her clearly shown below.



This has been forecast for days to be a "Fish Storm"
Though again I have low confidence
Track is set for the next 3 to 5 days.
Beyond that I'll wait to see what develops.

I'll update later as information comes in.


As for the tropical wave close to the US that everyone is watching, but the NHC has not yet designated in tropical update as of 8 AM. That could change, but the wave itself has to change or get into a better place int he atmosphere to allow development. What concerns me is that South Florida has been plagued daily by strong thunderstorms as one tropical wave after another has crossed over that area for the last few months. They are just waves and they amp up the already unstable air into huge colorful displays of monsoonal masterpieces as people try to navigate through the traffic on I95 while taking pictures of what seems like end of the world storms. My daughter was stuck in flooding on I95 in one of those storms as the water on the highway rose fast and luckily she was able to get where she is going and drain out the car.......  

So should anything develop and get into that sweet spot where low pressure is more available and the shear is low, the tropical wave could go from nothing much to something really fast. That happens often as the waters that surround the Florida peninsular are close to 90 degrees this time of year. So while there is nothing there currently we have to watch carefully when we see a strong "robust" tropical wave that stubbornly made it across the Atlantic despite SAL and lower water temperatures and strong shear there as well. Keep watching. 





You know it's September in Miami when you wake up to "Morning Rain" and that's a sign the pattern has changed, the calendar page is about to be turned and we remember it's prime time in the tropics.


People from North Carolina to Texas this time of year begin evaluating each storm from their perspective as well as their own excellent knowledge of the hurricane history in their own part of the world. No one has to remind New Orleans as www.nola.com knows as they re dealing with the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina this week. 





Stay tuned.......it's that time of year when those tropical waves begin to Twist and Shout even if they are screaming "Fish Storms" we always have to watch them as they are prone to do some unexpected things.

Besos BobbiStorm
@bobbistorm on Twitter










Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

posted by BobbiStorm @ 6:25 AM 0 comments