Hurricane Screamer

It always seems as though I am apologizing for not writing posts. Er, well, sorry about not writing posts.

I will have more news on progress with the HUD-1 program later this week, but for now I have some news regarding my blogroll. My friend Kathleen has moved from the area and closed her blog so I am removing that link. If she wants, she can always blog from this site as she has an account.

I am adding a link to the blog of another friend, Katheryn Swann, who also has an account here. This new link can be found on the right sidebar under the “blogs of friends” category.

To start you off on her blog, here is a link to her latest post:
Virtual Connections–An Allegory of Reality. Enjoy!

Just when I thought the entire season was over, it surprises me. There is a new yellow spot in the Atlantic, centered around a tropical wave, that has a 30 percent chance of developing. I’ll keep an eye on it, but my attention is still focused on Ida.

Something is wrong with local and long distance radar, but the rain field from Ida is so dense that it hardly matters. When the rain gets here, it’s here to stay for a few days. Look for the rain to begin sometime after 7 AM tomorrow morning.

If you want the regional radar, click here.

And you can use the links to the right to check our local weather pages.

TS Ida is now a tropical storm and is well into its US landfall. The ultimate effect on Glynn County of the storm remains obscure, but Ida may dissipate before it comes near. That does not mean that we will not see effects.

As of the 11 AM advisory, the last point on the three day track map is at 6 AM Wednesday morning, with Ida still in the Gulf, but heading to a point south of Jacksonville, FL. The forecast intensity is as a subtropical depression. The NHC has been speculating for days that Ida would merge, or become, a frontal system traveling east. So the storm will probably not go away, just transform.

Regardless of all this, our local forecast has bumped up the chances of rain by another 10 percent over the next few days. Starting at noon today, I will limit my discussion of Ida to current conditions without relying on the NHC forecasts. I will however, discuss the local weather forecast freely.

And here it is: “RAIN!”

Currently, it’s 82 degrees with a 15 MPH wind. Regional radar shows very little activity near us, but if the storm does move east, that will change.

Hurricane Ida has surprised me again. Not only has the storm increased in strength to a category two hurricane, but the forecast track has changed to place Glynn County much more near the center.

As of the 10 PM advisory, Ida had winds of 105 MPH and a central pressure of 979 MB. News reports of winds reaching 125 MPH with higher gusts are in error. Who knows, though. The 11 PM advisory might reflect that. The storm is heading towards the north-northwest at 14 MPH.

I’d like to point out that any impact on Glynn County from Ida is forecast from the very end of the track map, which is notorious for its wildly changing position and direction. All indications are, at this moment, that Glynn County will see some effects from Ida starting Tuesday morning.

But will we? I just can’t tell. The far end of the track map is changing too much. So any discussions about possible effects are contingent on the fact that the track map may change quite radically in just a few hours. I always write from that perspective anyway, as I have mentioned in the past, but it deserves special mention. This is because the situation is so changeable, yet has such good corroborating data (from the NWS) to support it, it’s hard to know what to write.

That said, the current track map now has Ida passing 70 miles south of us by 6 PM Wednesday as a subtropical depression. If that happens, we will see winds of up to 18 MPH (with 27 MPH gusts) tomorrow, and a 50 percent chance of rain tomorrow night. Our weather forecast then shows a 70 percent chance of rain through Wednesday, rip tides, and all the usual effects from tropical weather.

I’ll have more tomorrow on this.

Ida has strengthened to a hurricane this morning and is forecast to remain so until Tuesday morning. And the Shepard’s Crook is back.

The forecast track of Hurricane Ida now has the storm approaching New Orleans, making a close pass to Panama City, FL Wednesday morning and continuing a rightward turn until heading south on Thursday.

Incidentally, Tuesday morning is when Ida will be closest to the Georgia coast - about 250 miles. That’s close enough for some rain and winds, and our chances of rain on Tuesday night have increased to 70 percent.

One other interesting note on this storm is that the waters off the Florida coast are relatively cool, which will cause Ida to acquire sub-tropical characteristics. The storm could still bring lots of rain, but will have steadly weakening winds.

Currently, Ida has winds of 90 MPH and a central pressure of 983 MB. The storm is moving towards the northwest at 12 MPH.

Keep an eye on this very wacky storm.

Ida, now a tropical storm, has got one of the strangest track maps I have ever seen. The storm is forecast to travel north until almost the Alabama/Florida coast, and then turn sharply right towards Tampa. On the forecast track map, it looks like an upside down L. And what’s next? Will the storm continue it’s sharp turn until it heads south? Or straighten out, proceed east, and hit Tampa? There’s no telling.

In fact, last night, the forecast track did show Ida turning south. That track map was even stranger than the current map. I’m just going to wait until Monday afternoon until a clearer picture emerges. I don’t think at this point that Ida is a threat to Glynn County, but we will have to wait and see. The local forecast does show a 60 percent chance of rain on Tuesday, which is when Ida would be making itself felt. So be watchful.

As of the 5 PM ET advisory, Ida had winds of 70 MPH and is moving towards the north at 10 MPH. The storm is forecast to become a hurricane before passing between the Yucatan and Cuba tomorrow afternoon, and then continue on towards the Gulf Coast. After that, we enter into the strange part of the forecast track.

I made an error yesterday in discussing the area of storms off the coast of Central America, in that I did not research the direction of the storm center. I was assuming that the storm was moving to the west, but instead it was moving almost due north.

That single fact changes the entire picture of what will happen over the next week. Instead of becoming a Pacific storm, the storm may now menace the Louisiana coast in a week or so, and may do so as a tropical storm or worse.

The storm center has now gained enough strength to be declared not only a tropical storm but a hurricane, and is named Ida. Currently, Hurricane Ida is located at 12.8 north, 83.4 west, and is moving towards the northwest at seven miles an hour. Ida has winds of 75 MPH and a central pressure of 987 MB.

Ida is currently over Nicaragua and will be passing over Honduras, which will considerably weaken the storm. Ida is forecast to pass back over the Caribbean at 1 AM Saturday morning. If the storm survives all that time over land, then it will begin to gain strength again, pass east of the Yucatan Peninsula Monday afternoon, and then shoot up towards the Gulf coast of the United States.

And I was also wrong to call the season as being over. But I’ll bet this is the last storm…..

It’s been very quiet in the Atlantic for the last few weeks. But the Pacific still seems to be a bit on the warm side. There is a red spot in the extreme southwest corner of the Caribbean covering a stalled storm system that really, really wants to organize.

NOAA is sending out a Hurricane Hunter aircraft to investigate the area later this morning. If it is declared, and then moves towards the west, it would have to pass over a lot of land, so it might dissipate before it could strengthen to a threat. Not that the rain this storm is currently dumping on Central America isn’t a threat, but it’s better than the hurricanes they’ve had so far this year.

Currently, the storm centers around a 1008 MB low.

It’s November 4th, and I’m calling the Atlantic season over. We’ve had nothing significant for weeks; in fact, nothing really significant all season. There are two tropical waves, one of which is discussed above. There’s - just nothing happening. We’ve been very fortunate this year: not one single landfall on Texas, Florida or points between. It’s time to count our blessings and be thankful.

I’ll keep an eye on the NHC web site and on their RSS feed every day as I usually do, but I really don’t expect any more activity. So, until next year! (Unless I’m wrong, in which case I’ll ignore everything I just wrote and carry on.)

I’ve written this before this season, that I do not normally pay attention to Pacific tropical weather. But this news is so bad that I felt I must comment.

In the last few days, a tropical storm, named Rick, has formed and strengthened to a hurricane. That is pretty much average for this season; hardly anything for the Atlantic because the Pacific is sucking up all our heat. And what a lot of heat.

Hurricane Rick is now officially a category five hurricane with winds of 160 MPH and higher gusts. Even though only Rick’s outer rain bands are brushing along the Mexican coast, the swells from this monster of a storm are probably causing havoc for Mexico. Rick’s direction is towards the northwest at the moment, but that is forecast to change in three days towards the northeast and straight for Baja, Mexico.

That’s the bad news. The bad-but-better news is that Rick’s winds are forecast to be about 120 MPH upon landfall, and diminish to about 70 MPH after that. That’s still pretty bad, but won’t lead to total devastation.

In the meantime, nothing of note is happening in the Atlantic. As it has not happened over the last week.

Due to the cold weather I will not be participating in the Weather Permitting group this evening. 58 degrees and 12 MPH winds make for a wind chill in the mid-40’s. Brrrrrrrrr……

Next week should be a lot warmer. Until then!