Taking a Look at Invest 97 L Heading for the GOM

The above two images are images of 97 L.  The first being the AVN image and the second being the visible satellite image. The National Hurricane center places this system at a 30% chance of developing over the next 48 hours but a 50% chance of developing over the next 5 days. We mentioned last night on our Facebook that conditions are indeed somewhat favorable for this system to develop . Last night the vorticity was stretched out from SW to NE and today the vorticity has tightened up some compared to then...

The one thing that we think could be an issue with this system is the dry air that is off to the systems NW. Dry air tends to hinder developing systems . 

However, aside from the dry air issue conditions are somewhat favorable for development with this system. Shear is relatively low at 5-10 knots 

While the system is not in the greatest areas of convergence and divergence as it is off to the east of the system ..it is still in a somewhat favorable area.

However...even with conditions favorable the system still has a long way to go till it becomes classified as a depression because the vorticity centers are not stacked and aligned. You can see this when you look at the 500,750 and 850  mb levels.

Guidance was rather lack luster at developing this system but the guidance has now started to come in stronger with the system and you can see this by looking at the High Res GFS

While images are not available for posting at this time the UKMET is also coming in with a more organized tropical system. The GGEM on the other hand is fairly weak and west with the system. 

As far as track guidance is concerned..

Majority of the guidance takes this system into the GOM and looks like it could make landfall anywhere from Louisiana to the Western Panhandle of Florida. This should be an enhanced rainmaker across the Southeast ...and in the longer term it looks like a front could stall along the east coast and then the remnants of this system would ride up along that front bringing an enhanced chance of rainfall in areas further to the north.

At this point and time we think that a minimal tropical storm is the most likely result. However..being that so far this season ..there has been virtually no tropical storms to track (that have effected the US) this is liable to get some attention. The reality though is that the biggest threat will be some heavy rains from this system.