Heavy rains hit Florida coast; Jova and Irwin a threat to Mexico
A large low pressure system with heavy rain is developing this morning over Cuba, South Florida, and the Bahamas. The counter-clockwise flow around this low is bringing strong winds and heavy rains to much of the Florida coast. Radar-estimated rainfall amounts are already in excess of four inches along a stretch of Florida coast from West Palm Beach to Daytona Beach. Much of the region, including Cocoa Beach, is under a flood watch, high surf advisories, and a high wind watch for wind gusts of 45 - 55 mph. These these conditions will spread northwards to Georgia by Sunday, and South Carolina by Monday. I doubt that this storm will acquire enough organization to evolve into a subtropical storm that gets a name, based on the latest model output, and the fact that the storm's center may well be over the state of Florida. NHC is currently giving this storm a 20% chance of becoming a named tropical or subtropical storm by Monday morning. This is a large, diffuse system that will bring strong winds and heavy rains to a large area of the Southeast U.S. coast, regardless of the exact center location. Since the storm is going to get its start as a cold-cored upper-level low pressure system with some dry air aloft, it will not be able to intensify quickly.
Figure 1. Radar-estimated rainfall from the Melbourne, Florida radar as of Saturday morning.
Figure 2. Rainfall forecast for the 5-day period ending at 8 am EDT Thursday, October 12, 2011. The storm system affecting Florida this weekend is expected to bring up to 7 inches of rain along the coast. Heavy rains associated with a strong trough of low pressure are also expected to dump 4 - 6 inches of rain over drought-stricken areas of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas. Image credit: NOAA/HPC.
Heavy rain event coming for drought-stricken regions of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas
A strong low pressure system is expected to track across the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles this weekend, bringing the heaviest rains of the year to drought-stricken portions of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas, including Abilene, where a flash flood watch is posted today. Rainfall in this region has been 13 - 20 inches below normal for the year; Lubbock, Texas has had just 3 inches of rain this year, compared to a normal of 16 inches. Rainfall amount of 1 - 4 inches will be common in the region over the weekend, and may be able to reduce drought conditions from the highest level (exceptional) to the second highest level (extreme.) However, the heaviest rains will stay confined to the western half of Texas, and Texas's major cities such as Houston will see very little rain over the weekend.
Figure 3. Visible satellite image of Hurricane Irwin and Tropical Storm Jova yesterday afternoon over the East Pacific.
Jova and Irwin: trouble for Mexico's Eastern Pacific coast
In the Eastern Pacific off the coast of Mexico, Tropical Storm Jova continues to slowly intensify. Jova will turn north and then northeast over the weekend as a strong trough of low pressure dives southward over northern Mexico. The computer models have come into better agreement on the track of Jova, with the region of coast centered on Manzanillo at greatest risk of a strike. Jova is under light wind shear of 5 - 10 knots, and shear is predicted to stay in the low to moderate range between now and landfall. Ocean temperatures are warm, 28 - 29°C, but the warm waters do not extend to great depth, limiting Jova's potential for rapid intensification. The upper atmosphere is also not cold enough to give Jova the kind of instability typically needed for rapid intensification. Nonetheless, both the GFDL and HWRF models predict Jova will intensify into a major Category 3 hurricane before landfall on Tuesday on the Mexican coast. The official NHC forecast is less aggressive, bringing Jova to Category 2 strength, which is probably reasonable, given the uncertainties regarding the possible interference from Hurricane Irwin to its west, and the fact that several other of our intensity models show very little strengthening. Regardless of Jova's strength at landfall, the storm will bring very heavy rains to the Mexican coast capable of causing dangerous flash floods and mudslides, beginning on Monday.
Once Jova has made landfall, Mexico needs to concern itself with Hurricane Irwin, farther to the west. Irwin will also be turned north and then northeast towards the coast of Mexico this weekend by the same trough of low pressure expected to affect Jova. The longer range computer forecast models show Irwin could make landfall as a hurricane on the Mexican coast late next week, along the same stretch of coast Jova will affect. If this verifies, the one-two punch of heavy rains from two tropical cyclones within a week could cause a devastating flood situation along the Mexican coast. However, the track forecast for Irwin has a higher degree of uncertainty than usual, and Baja is also at risk from this storm.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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Still sunny and dry and breezy here in Naples. It's odd to see all that moisture pinwheeling across the region with nary a drop making its way to the ground here. Yet...
Looks like nearly every model has now shifted to the West Coast of Florida and the GOM. Big shift over nite with the Consensus of models.
It appears from the Consensus of Models that the Low Pressure should develop near the NorthWestern side of Cuba. With the amount of Shear it would nearly have to be a SubTropical System one would think.
Thanks Dr. Masters.
Hey Tim, got a link to a model or two?
Here you go!
Loop
Gulf Of Mexico - Water Vapor
Loop
This is the first dark morning in Austin in.... a year? If it does rain, the streets will be like mayonnaise with all the accumulated oil and gas.
Thanks bro, 'preciate it!
Go to my blog.........i have some running there but, most on my Website which i cannot post or get banned. Sorry!
I was on the beach here in Jensen the day following Irene's passage and there were hundreds of sea turtle eggs rolling in the surf from the erosion.
This event will get some more. :(
No, When Phillipe curved he stayed within 5 degrees or so of latitude and longitude and was a fairly disorganized system making it appear like that.
NO SIGNIFICANT WEATHER MAKERS FORESEEN
IN THE NEXT SEVERAL DAYS.
WTF, it has been the same for days.... if not weeks! This must end soon! What's going on where are the october rains!!!!!
Well we got some rain yesterday and some thunderstorms last night...
and today is just nasty! several lines have come thur here in Broward County but it looks
like Central Florida and then north Florida will get most of the rain from this storm..
Which is good because central Florida rains flow into Lake Okeechobee and it should
finally bring that lake back up to "normal" 13-15 ft...anything over 15 ft they drain out anyway..
Hope this system and the one in Texas brings some rain relief to the drought areas.
Could be a spin starting SE of Jamaica possibly on the last loops!
interesting to me, send me some please.. it's a desert here. not normal this time of year... MJO do something!!!
It has nothing to do with Philippe being disorganized, it just shows that Philippe had a very erratic track.
And that WU screwed up and made Philippe's wind radii look like a block. lol
Jova? No. Irwin? Down to 70 kt. (80 mph).
Irwin looks horrible. I think his center is partially exposed. Jova looks the same, just a humongous blob of strong thunderstorms.
Yeah, Irwin's center is exposed. We'll see Jova better soon, when the sun rises over there.
-----
And the wind will only get stronger...
Look at those beautiful plumes of moisture streaming into Texas. Now if 99 would just make the jump across.. she could come straight here like Hermine did.
Not a very pretty day for the eastern coast of the Sunshine State.
It's beautiful
Just off SW Florida and moving near the Florida Straits is the mostly likely Development areas. My best guess would be off SE Florida looking at everything. We could very well get a LLC spinning under the ULL low in the GOM. That would be my likely way of developing something as conditions would not be all that bad in that position. You can see the ULL below.
One characteristic of subtropical is that dry air doesn't impede it. Lee gobbled up dry air with gusto and strengthened.. he was deemed to be a hybrid in the end.
TTAA00 KNHC DDHHMM
TROPICAL WEATHER OUTLOOK
NWS NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL
800 AM EDT SAT OCT 8 2011
FOR THE NORTH ATLANTIC...CARIBBEAN SEA AND THE GULF OF MEXICO...
THE NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER IS ISSUING ADVISORIES ON TROPICAL
STORM PHILIPPE...LOCATED ABOUT 865 MILES EAST OF BERMUDA...OR
ABOUT 1350 MILES WEST-SOUTHWEST OF THE AZORES ISLANDS.
1. A BROAD SURFACE TROUGH INTERACTING WITH AN UPPER-LEVEL LOW IS
PRODUCING WIDESPREAD CLOUDINESS AND SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS OVER
THE NORTHWESTERN CARIBBEAN SEA AND EXTENDING NORTHWARD OVER MUCH
OF CUBA...MOST OF THE FLORIDA PENINSULA...AND ALL OF THE BAHAMAS.
GRADUAL DEVELOPMENT OF THIS LARGE AREA OF DISTURBED WEATHER IS
POSSIBLE OVER THE NEXT FEW DAYS AS IT MOVES SLOWLY NORTHWARD OR
NORTHWESTWARD. THIS SYSTEM HAS A LOW CHANCE...20 PERCENT...OF
BECOMING A TROPICAL OR SUBTROPICAL CYCLONE DURING THE NEXT 48
HOURS. REGARDLESS OF DEVELOPMENT...THIS DISTURBANCE WILL PRODUCE
STRONG GUSTY WINDS AND LOCALLY HEAVY RAINFALL ACROSS PORTIONS OF
THE BAHAMAS AND THE FLORIDA PENINSULA OVER THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS.
ELSEWHERE...TROPICAL CYCLONE FORMATION IS NOT EXPECTED DURING THE
NEXT 48 HOURS.
$$
FORECASTER STEWART
NNNN
NHC jumped right on it!
Wow! Irwin has been ripped apart.
I agree.
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