Severe Weather Potential for Aug 20, 2009

Daily Discussion for Aug 20th

To all those reading this on a daily basis I am going to try and update it earlier despite being caught up with the hurricane. 

Daily Discussion for Aug 20th

High temperature at KABE for the 18-19th was 89 degrees

Storms and rumours of storms!

Today is going to be another hot day along the eastern seaboard from SNE and points south and east along the coast with temperatures in the 85-95 range. Other areas in the NE will bein the low to mid 80s except for Maine where 70-80 will be the rule..

As far as the weather is concerned skies look to start off Partly cloudy-partly sunny but with an increasing chance of showers and thunderstorms some of which could become severe. I will try to get a detailed map up for any severe weather before 5 AM....
Remember if any severe weather occurs by you to always remain in a safe location!

Update on Hurricane Bill! Now Category 3

I had to take a break from the PC and have been trying to catch up outside of the forum on things such as Data...

The most recent coordinates I have found are here..
18/2345 UTC 17.1N 52.7W T6.0/6.0 BILL 

I am going to say that after looking at the latest images that we are still heading WNW , stairstepping if you may.. The northerly part of the west northwest portion at this current time could be making slightly more headway then the westerly part. Compared to the last coordinates as of 5 PM we have gained.. .5 degrees north and .5 degrees west. This is using NHC as of 5 PM and Recon information now...

So it looks like it would be fair to say WNW...IMO 

Some images are above that are relevant to all below...

Now what is beginning to become concerning to me is the islands that are in front of Bill...

From the latest 5 PM forecast discussion
BILL IS EXPECTED TO
GRADUALLY TURN TO THE NORTHWEST DURING THE NEXT DAY OR TWO AS A
WEAKNESS DEVELOPS IN THE SUBTROPICAL RIDGE OVER THE WESTERN
ATLANTIC.
This gradual turn to the NW seems to keep getting delayed with each and every update.

As you can see from the above images the islands and the hurricanes distance are getting smaller and smaller..

Now as of 8:30 PM Bill is a category 3

WTNT63 KNHC 190030
TCUAT3
HURRICANE BILL TROPICAL CYCLONE UPDATE
NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL AL032009
830 PM AST TUE AUG 18 2009

...BILL BECOMES A MAJOR HURRICANE...

REPORTS FROM A NOAA HURRICANE HUNTER PLANE INDICATE THAT BILL HAS
STRENGTHENED AND MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS HAVE INCREASED TO NEAR 125
MPH...205 KM/HR. BILL A CATEGORY 3 HURRICANE ON THE SAFFIR/SIMPSON
HURRICANE SCALE. A COMPLETE ADVISORY WILL BE ISSUED BY THE NATIONAL
HURRICANE CENTER AT 11 PM AST.

KIMBERLAIN/PASCH

So my attention right now lies on those islands. 

From there the question is where do we go? 

I want people to realize, not once have i ever said that Hurricane Bill was going to make landfall on the east coast. I did say that depending on how close the actual track becomes , it will impact the east coast. There is no doubt about that. The only way this will not impact the east coast is if it is well, well out at sea.
Now as of 00z early dynamical models... they are tightly clustered together compared to 18Z

Essentially further to the west as well...
Now perhaps most shocking and remember that the operational run tends to go towards its ensembles...

This should perhaps show why the east coast is not out of the woods yet...
Can you say west? 

So please do not write Bill off because that would be the foolish thing a person could do at this point and time! All eyes should be on this. Especially the Leeward Islands and the Northeast!

Anyways Weather Discussion for August 18th ,The Heat Keeps Blasting Away!

Sorry about the lateness of these daily weather discussions but Hurricane bill is keeping me occupied right now daily from 11 AM to 5 am. Sleep deprived to say the least

Anyways Weather Discussion for August 18th ,The Heat Keeps Blasting Away!

The high temperature for the 17th at KABE was 90 degrees.....Today promises to be another Hot day! There is no way around this as once again the temperatures will be 85-95 degrees in the region from north to south, mid atlantic to the northeast...As far as the weather most areas will be under mostly sunny skies..however..with the day time heating and a cold front making its approach towards the region there will be a better chance for showers and thunderstorms. I have not had the time to see if any could be severe as I have not even checked SPC lately. However the best chances for these showers and thunderstorms will be Western Areas such as western NY and western PA..Most other regions should remain under partly to mostly sunny skies and have to tolerate once again the hot temperatures...Again, if you are outside please keep that bottle of water handy because dehydration is a very real reality! Have a great day and see you in the tropics!

Hurricane Bill Update for August 17th..

Also Bill better start moving to the NW in an awful hurry because he is dangerously getting closer to the islands that he is suppose to go north of....

A couple interesting points from the NHC discussion

1. AS A
RESULT...THE GENERAL WEST-NORTHWESTWARD TRACK THAT BILL HAS
MAINTAINED FOR SEVERAL DAYS SHOULD BEGIN TO BEND MORE TOWARD THE
NORTHWEST BY 48-72 HOURS. 

This gives a potential 2-3 more days on a west northwest track...

2.BILL IS FORECAST TO GROW A LITTLE MORE IN
SIZE DURING THE FORECAST PERIOD...ALTHOUGH SOME GUIDANCE SUCH AS THE
GFS SUGGESTS THAT IT MAY BECOME EVEN LARGER THAN INDICATED IN THE
NHC FORECAST.

This is going to give bill a wide impact path...so if the final destination ends up on the left side of the cone you will be experiencing conditions from Bill.
3. BILL IS MOVING TOWARD THE WEST-NORTHWEST NEAR 17 MPH
This continue increase speed in bill. Again, I can not express how important this is. The longer bill maintains a west northwest direction at a fast speed the more territory he will cover in the course of time before any turn to the NW..
4. In reference to the image above. Notice the periphery of the flow that is around the two areas of high pressure. This is your ridge and its influence is well westerly spread. The flow around the periphery is east to west on the south side and essentially west to east on the north side. 

Until these currents actually change ..Bill will continue to maintain his west to northwest track.

5. The models have essentially since about 06 Z last night have been trending west. This includes the ECM in a shift to the west. I mentioned how UKMET was a red flag to the ECM...now the ECM at 12 Z shifted south and west along with the rest of the guidance. As of 00z this trend has continued with the early dynamical models.

The shifts in these models can be attributed to several factors. These factors can include speed, slowing of the trough, angle of the trough, strength of the ridge along with a myriad of other factors...

At this point and time all the information that we have obtained has been based off of satellite observations and other technology but none of what we are recieving has been based off recon information.

I believe that is scheduled for tomorrow. So until that point and time the models are doing there best at interpreting the data that they are ingesting. However..once we have actual real time recon data sampled into the models..we will then discover how strong the ridge is..More specific information on Hurricane Bill itself in relation to size, strength, speed and coordinates and we are bound to see a change in track as well.

Now..unless the models are way off with what they have been digesting..i think there is a good chance that the track will shift west with the recon data.

August 17th Weather Discussion The heat is strong, but will it last long?

August 17th Weather Discussion

The heat is strong, but will it last long?
The high temperature at KABE fell just shy of 90 yesterday at 89 degrees... for Aug 16th

Today is going to be another sweltering day! There is no way around it. Also todays weather will feature basically your typical summer day! Mostly sunny and hot conditions. There could be a isolated shower or thundershower in a few locales but the chances are less then 20%...

High temperatures up and down the mid atlantic and the northeast, from south to north or north to south will be in the range of 85-95 degrees. Once again keep that water bottle nearby if planning any outdoor activities!

Update on the tropics for Sunday August 16th..

Still alot going on in the tropics today. So let me get right to it.  First stop on the agenda is to the west of Florida and that is Tropical Storm Claudette. Latest coordinates put this cyclone at 29.5 N & 85.6 W. Current animated satellite appears to be showing Claudette starting to move somewhat more towards the west north west, instead of just NW. This could be important as this would keep it over the open waters longer and possibly give it a chance to strengthen. It currently appears to be in the process of reorganizing. If neccessary will have an update on this later tonight. I still think that there is a possibility of this cyclone, if the west movement becomes realized, of tracking more towards Mississippi/Louisianna. If however, Claudette is not reorganizing with a center further to the south and east then landfall will be tonight in the late night hours in the Florida Panhandle.

Moving further south and east into the Atlantic, we come to what is left of ANA. As mentioned yesterday, I pretty much felt that ANA was heading for dissipation as most of the models were in agreement on that scenario. As you can see from looking at the animated satellite on ANA ..she has degenerated into a Tropical Depression and is looking pretty much scattered and ragged. In my current thinking she should just continue to dissipate and become a tropical wave. Her latest coordinates were 15.1 N and 58.8 West. This should be the last update on ANA that you will see under the tropical update from R.W.S.

Next stop is still further east and south into the Atlantic ocean and that brings us to Tropical Storm Bill, soon to be Hurricane Bill. Bills latest coordinates as of 5 PM from NHC was 12.8 N and 40.0 W. Now this is significant in my opinion. Models such as the ECM did not have Bill reaching 40 W until 8 PM tonight. This indicates that Bill is moving faster then what is currently being modeled by the most superior model-the ECM. 

So what we have currently going on is Tropical Bill strengthening, and Tropical Storm Bill continuing to move off the the west northwest. This general motion is expected to continue at least for the next few days as it is to the south of a high pressure ridge.

Now..models, such as the GFS, ECM, have a weakness developing in this ridge due to a trough of low pressure moving off the coast of new jersey and the upper level low going to the north of Bill..which would create a weakness in the ridge and cause Bill to start turning more towards the NW.

However, the question becomes is this mini trough going to be enough to create a weakness in the ridge and strong enough to cause a pull to the NW on Bill? At this point and time,I believe that Bill will bypass this mini trough and continue on a WNW track..

What happens after this is highly dependant on a trough that is forecasted to move along the northern tier of the states and progress its way into the great lakes and northeast. The timing of this trough is ultra important to the destination of Bill. The timing of this trough is ultra important as to whether Bill remains in the open atlantic harmlessly effecting noone or if it actually ends up closer to the east coast.

Now..what we know at this point and time is that there is going to be a strong ridge to the north of Bill. We also know that there is expected to be a trough coming into scenario. What we do not know is whether or not this trough is going to be fast enough to effect Bill or if Bill could be fast enough to out race the trough approaching east.

The fact that Bill is progressing to the west northwest faster then what the ECM has modeled..could indicate that Bill could get closer to the east coast then what the models currently indicate. Also, one has to take into consideration the intensification process of how strong Bill becomes and whether or not he can more or less create his own environment. This is not out of the question at the moment. Bill appears to be intensifying quite nicely and his speed seems to be faster then modeled.

So at this point, despite what the global models are saying..it would not be safe for anyone along the east coast to dismiss soon to be hurricane Bill. 

Hurricane IKE was forecasted several days straight to recurve and the final result was Galveston Texas.

Also another thing to consider is Gloria and how there origin of latitude was essentially in the same location and how there tracks are very similar. 

Thats all for tonight as I think there is pretty much to ponder over!