Tropical Storm Debby Update #3

The above is a most recent water vapor image of Tropical Storm Debby. You can tell looking at this image that Debby continues to be plagued by dry air. Debby also continues to be plagued by shear. These two ingredients of dry air and shear are hindering any development from reoccurring and in addition to these two factors with the slow movement upwelling of cooler waters and close proximity to land.

Present movement of Debby is towards the East and it continues to move slowly. We are going to post a image of the steering currents which helps to explain what is happening..

Debby is moving in between ridging to the west and the subtropical high or ridging to the east. This has created what we have labeled as a pathway to escape where it will be moving east across Florida but then it will start to move towards the NE..

Guidance tonight is divergent in timing and somewhat in speed as well. We are going to start with the two models that stand out the most . This would be the UKMET/GGEM.

UKMET basically is in agreement with the GFS/ECM as far as track is concerned ..however it is much faster then those two models.

This is the GGEM at 108..Here after the GGEM becomes kind of suspicious. From 114-132 it looks like it opens up and weakens by 132 though it closes back off again off the GA coast. Which then moves inland over GA at 144 to move slightly east by 156 and then stall there thru 168. By 180 moves slightly more east and intensifies and then stalls in that location thru 228 (while deepening) and then moves out to sea or NE by 240 hours and down to 989 MBS.

This seems to be out of place in reference to timing and as well tracking.

The two models are essentially in agreement above. So it would appear that if the above guidance is correct that Debby is going to not pose to much of a threat to the Carolinas.

This is the rest of the model guidance as of the 6 Z runs..

You can see what they essentially due is move Debby east across Florida and then towards the NE to the east of the Carolina Coastline.

The above image is the GFS ensembles and you can see that the majority of them take this almost on a ENE track..again away from the Carolinas.

With the close proximity to land..the dry air & the increasing shear we are not anticipating Debby to gain much strength before making landfall in Florida and crossing Florida. Debby may actually decrease to a depression once over Florida but has the potential to re intensify once back over the Gulf stream off the coast of Florida. It is still in the realms of possibilities that Debby could become a Cat 1 Hurricane once emerging back over the waters.

In the mean time Debby will continue to produce heavy rains across the state of Florida. Evacuations in some locations are going on so please pay attention to your favorite source of weather.

We will have another full update about 24 hrs. from now that will include the final track for Debby.