Tropical Storm Emily continues to threaten Haiti; More extreme heat in Central U.S.
Tropical Storm Emily remains unorganized this morning, and continues to linger just south of Haiti, near 17.3°N, 72.3°W. Emily is 90 miles south of Port au Prince, Haiti. Storm motion over the past 24 hours has been slow, varying between completely stopped and west to west-northwest at 5 mph. This motion (or lack thereof) is still something that the models aren't analyzing well. Satellite imagery shows that thunderstorm activity on the north side of Emily seems to be disrupted, possibly by the terrain of Hispaniola, but also potentially by the continued moderate shear to the north of the storm. Wind shear has weakened to the northwest of the storm in the past 24 hours, but it will probably not be enough to allow Emily to undergo any significant intensification. The layer of dry air that we've been talking about for the past few days has also all but dissipated to the west and north of the storm. As the National Hurricane Center has been forecasting, environmental conditions are becoming slightly more favorable for the storm. Satellite estimates of wind motion suggest that low level circulation in the storm has become very broad and extends north over Hispaniola, which indicates that there's potential for the storm to undergo a quick jump to the north, but overall the storm remains weak and this seems unlikely. Emily continues to be tilted to the east with height, but doesn't appear as sheared as yesterday morning.
Conditions in Hispaniola have surely deteriorated over the past 24 hours, however, thunderstorm activity appears to have weakened over the island this morning. Infrared satellite imagery shows that cloud tops have warmed in the past 6 hours on the north side of the storm, which means that strong thunderstorms are no longer building high into the atmosphere. High resolution model forecasts (see Figure 1) have continued to predict that the heaviest rain will fall to the east of the storm. The longer Emily tracks west without taking a significant turn to the northwest, the more likely it is that Haiti will see the most extreme rainfall in the storm. Overall, 6 to 12 inches of rain is expected to fall, with local amounts up to 20 inches possible in higher terrain. Flash floods and mudslides are a serious threat.
Figure 1. Forecast radar and sea level pressure from the 06Z (2am EDT) run of the HWRF high resolution model. While I think that the model was initialized poorly and doesn't accurately represent where the storm will travel over the next 24 hours, I do think that the precipitation field is accurate. The strongest rain and winds have been on the east and north sides of the storm over the past couple of days. If Emily continues to move west before taking a significant turn to the northwest, Haiti could receive the strongest impact from the storm.
Forecast for Tropical Storm Emily
Models continue to waver back and forth on Emily's forecast track. Yesterday evening, the HWRF model forecast Emily to cross over Hispaniola and undergoing a close encounter with the Florida coastline. Last night, the National Hurricane Center wrote that "if Emily does not begin its northwestward turn soon…a watch could be required for parts of southern Florida today." Since the storm appears to be moving slightly more to the north than west this morning, this doesn't look like it will be necessary, although the forecast remains very uncertain. In today's 06Z runs, both the HWRF and the GFDL are probably forecasting Emily to move too far north in the next 12 hours. Given the present direction and speed of the storm, it's hard to see these two models' forecasts coming to fruition. The official forecast track from the National Hurricane Center is a turn to the northwest over the next 6 to 12 hours, with landfall in Haiti happening this afternoon. Beyond that, they forecast Emily to stay on a northwest course through the Bahamas, where Emily could restrengthen a bit before making a turn to the northeast on Sunday, although they qualify this forecast with the fact that it's very uncertain, and that the global models dissipate Emily after crossing Hispaniola. The official forecast track does not have Emily making any landfall in Florida, but the Miami to West Palm Beach area is still within the cone of uncertainty.
Interestingly, the models that have done the best job at predicting the track of Emily thus far are the less relied-on statistical track models—those that don't take into account any current atmospheric dynamics. If Emily remains on a west to west-northwest track today, we cannot rule out that it cross over a larger area of Cuba, approaching the southeast portion of Florida. However, given the amount of land interaction in this potential track, the probability of Emily remaining a tropical cyclone in this scenario is low.
Figure 2. Satellite imagery of Tropical Storm Emily at 10:15am EDT. The strongest thunderstorm activity is now in the southern portion of the storm. Thunderstorms over Hispaniola appeared to weaken this morning.
Typhoon Muifa
Typhoon Muifa continues to be a category 2 typhoon on the Saffir-Simpson scale. Satellite imagery shows a well developed storm that is moving west-northwest. Over the next day, Muifa is expect to turn to the northwest as it approaches China. Today's track forecast is more north and east of yesterday's, with a brief landfall just north of Shanghai, potentially as a category 3.
Figure 3. MODIS satellite imagery of Typhoon Muifa from earlier today, plotted using NASA's new Rapid Response Web Mapping Service.
Central U.S. heatwave
The heat continues for the central U.S., where I've heard reports that local media in the region were canceling all of their outdoor shots because of the dangerous conditions. Here are some of yesterday's extreme temperatures, which were compiled by our weather historian, Christopher C. Burt:
Little Rock, Arkansas set an all-time record with 114°F (the old record was 112°F set in 1986). Fort Smith, Arkansas set an all time record of 115°F (the old record was 113°F set both Tuesday and previously in 1936).
State maximum air temperatures from Wednesday:
• Arkansas: 116° at Silver Hill (4° short of state all-time record)
• Oklahoma: 115° at Atoka
• Louisiana: 111° at Caney
• Texas: 111° at Fort Worth and Wichita Falls (that also had a record high minimum of 88° this morning)
• Missouri: 109° at Branson and Ava
The heat index is also at play in this heat wave; some incredible values recorded yesterday include 126° in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, 125° in Walnut Ridge, Arkansas, and 122° in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. The GFS continues to forecast heat index values around 120° in the lower Mississippi Valley through the weekend.
Angela
Reader Comments
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SUNDAY...THE WESTERLIES ALOFT WILL EXTEND FURTHER SOUTHWARD AND
ENCOMPASS MOST IF NOT ALL OF THE FORECAST AREA...AS THE RIDGING
ALOFT IS SUPPRESSED FURTHER SOUTH. THIS IN TURN ALLOWS FOR THE
INLAND TROUGH TO AGAIN SHIFT BACK INTO CLOSER PROXIMITY TO THE
FORECAST AREA AS IT FORCES THE SUB TROPICAL ATLANTIC RIDGE TO PUSH
SE AGAIN. LOW LEVEL CONVERGENCE WITH THE TROUGH AND A CONTINUATION
OF AMPLE MOISTURE WILL AGAIN LEAD TO CHANCE POPS ACROSS INLAND
AREAS. SIMILAR 850 MB TEMPS AND 1000-850 MB THICKNESS VALUES TO
SATURDAY WILL SUPPORT MAX TEMPS IN THE LOWER AND MIDDLE 90S. WHEN
COMBINED WITH MIDDLE 70S DEW POINTS WE ANTICIPATE ANOTHER HEAT
ADVISORY.
TROPICAL CYCLONE EMILY WILL BE FAR TO THE SOUTH OF THE AREA DURING
THIS TIME...WITH THE MOST RECENT NHC FORECAST PLACING IT EAST OF THE
FLORIDA PENINSULA DURING THIS TIME.
I would say to just keep an eye on it and think about what might have to be done in case a tropical storm came ashore. Until this gets north of Haiti and Cuba, we won't have a great idea of what south Florida could be dealing with, if it's even a landfall, and either way it shouldn't be a hurricane.
Yeah, it looks to me like the mid level circulation may be getting caught in the upper flow. It looks like it might detach and shoot north and then northeast. Not sure about that but it appears that might happen.
ok i see it.. but looks like is
17.1n
72.5
It's enough. It's just not strong enough to move her any faster than she is.
Local weather has been off too, they keep trying to bring dry air into our area, telling us its going to dry out, but deep tropical moisture remains in place is allowing heavy showers to pop all over despite warm capping air in the mid levels. Some of the local guys had 10% chance of a "light shower" for my area, I picked up 0.92 today in 15 minutes from a sea breeze shower.
If the weather was actually the way they forecasted it the last several weeks, we would still be in a a drought getting worse, I'm not sure why this year they keep showing such low rain chances when we are having a pretty normal rain season so far, yeah the way we've been getting rain is weird but its been pretty normal for most of us. Although the distribution has been kinda extreme, some places keep getting rain over and over again, while other miss it. Ive had 24 inches of rain since the end of June, while some places may have only had 5 to 8.
As far as who is on forecasting duty at the NHC lately, it seems to me they are basing too much on the models instead of thinking for themselves which is probably closer to some of what we are seeing.
As I said though, I am only 20 years old and only going into my second year full time college, I haven't even started the actual MET courses, just physics, chemistry, Calculus, and all the liberal studies first. There is so much more for me to learn, I have yet a clue what its like to be PRO.
That being said I don't want to criticize them, it just seems odd to me, I would love to find out some day why they do things the way they do. I have a lot of respect for them still so, don't think I am attacking them by any means. I'm just a little confused as to why they are sticking with the models, despite that the models have been proven quite inaccurate with Emily so far.
Thank you!
Good post :)
Thanks for the screenshots of HH recon flight....
Greatly appreciated!
16.9333N 72.1333W and no center yet....
so if it is weak now, are they expecting it to strengthen then? not trying to be redundant, just trying to understand the models take on this... it seems to be going against everything at this point lol
Very strange, pressure has been rising for the last couple readings as Recon has been going north
Lol, to be honest i'm not even the one making them. I know how to, but guys on another forum i'm on do it so quick I can't keep up. End up just stealing theres and posting it here because they're a good visual.
me too. she is not looking good at all.
Right now just about everybody is assuming that Emily will survive passage over the mountains, for the sake of offering a forecast that illustrates the potential dangers to the Bahamas and Florida. Nobody can accurately predict how torn up a weak storm will be upon crossing Hispaniola. She could very well just fall apart. If she were to survive, then some gradual regeneration and strengthening would be likely.
Thanks :)
Hey, I don't know about you, but Emily looks like its really struggling right now, even as convection is beginning to wane I'm have a hard time find the 850 MB vort MAX with Emily, I see very little low level spin so far, it will be interesting to see what recon find the next several hours.
Either means a huge pressure gradient (unlikely), or a much weakened storm (more likely).
Possibly waiting for the first vortex message?
000
URNT15 KNHC 041750
AF306 1205A EMILY HDOB 12 20110804
174030 1658N 07209W 8422 01604 0134 +170 +063 155025 025 021 000 03
174100 1659N 07210W 8434 01590 0132 +172 +063 159025 026 020 000 03
174130 1701N 07212W 8429 01599 0135 +166 +062 160026 027 022 000 00
174200 1702N 07213W 8428 01597 0136 +165 +061 158026 026 023 000 00
174230 1703N 07214W 8432 01592 0136 +163 +061 153025 026 022 000 03
174300 1704N 07216W 8433 01589 0136 +159 +061 148023 025 027 006 03
174330 1705N 07218W 8444 01580 0133 +165 +061 157019 022 027 004 00
174400 1706N 07219W 8428 01595 0132 +167 +060 171022 025 018 000 00
174430 1706N 07221W 8426 01597 0131 +168 +059 167025 026 017 000 00
174500 1707N 07223W 8429 01593 0134 +165 +060 166025 025 018 000 03
174530 1708N 07224W 8428 01596 0135 +161 +061 163024 025 018 000 03
174600 1708N 07226W 8436 01587 0136 +159 +061 165026 027 019 000 00
174630 1708N 07228W 8429 01593 0133 +163 +062 166026 027 019 000 00
174700 1708N 07230W 8432 01591 0134 +161 +062 170024 025 019 000 03
174730 1708N 07231W 8425 01596 0134 +162 +063 173023 024 018 000 00
174800 1708N 07233W 8433 01589 0133 +164 +064 175022 023 018 000 00
174830 1708N 07235W 8429 01593 0131 +165 +064 168019 021 017 000 00
174900 1708N 07237W 8428 01593 0129 +170 +065 162019 020 018 000 03
174930 1708N 07238W 8429 01595 0127 +172 +066 175016 018 019 000 03
175000 1708N 07240W 8426 01593 0126 +171 +067 187016 016 021 001 03
$$
;
The storm isn't wsw of them, it's just to the northwest of them. Their at 17N, Emily is probably around 17.2N.
Definitely. They won't even have a center due to the poor observations in this area. They'll have a difficult time with this update because of not having any info from the west side of the storm.
It wouldn't stun me with the way she looks. Do you think if she were to dissipate, there would be much chance of redevelopment around the Bahamas?
Lol i'm thinking the same thing, but didn't want to say it....
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