The one saving grace with Maria is it's much more an Andrew than an Irma. The worst of it will be highly contained.
Hurricane Maria was strengthening as it barreled towards Martinique and Puerto Rico on Monday while the Irma-battered Caribbean islands braced for the arrival of yet another potentially powerful storm.
As of 11 a.m., Maria had grown into a "rapidly intensifying" Category 3 storm with maximum sustained winds of 120 mph and was about 60 miles east of Martinique, a French island that is home to some 400,000 people, the National Hurricane Center said.
Maria could grow into a "major hurricane" by Monday night or early Tuesday as it takes aim at Puerto Rico's southern coast, the hurricane center said.
Doesn't Jose dying quickly increase the danger of Maria going toward Florida?
Latest MARIA GFS run is slightly slower and more west than previous runs long term. This trend is slightly worrying as increases probability of a landfall path on eastern seaboard.
EDIT: Looks like a coastal NC landfall for MARIA on this GFS run before turning slowly...definitely shifted the storm westerly.
Is there any detrimental effect for all the churning going on with the Middle Atlantic Ocean this year?
So many powerful storms cutting though makes me wonder. Or do Hurricanes mostly just affect the upper layers of the ocean?
Seeing ocean water pulled back off of beaches for some half-mile or so exposing the floor after Irma was pretty amazing. Even for High-Low Tide's sake. Makes me wonder if anything is going on in the middle Atlantic other than some angry fish being tossed and turned.
But below the ocean's surface, the currents and turbulence beneath those waves can also be quite destructive. Unlike places above the surface, the ocean doesn't ”forget" about the storm very quickly... strong currents and turbulence have been known to exist up to a week after the storm passes overhead. Damaging currents can extend down to at least 300 feet below the surface, capable of dismantling coral reefs, relocating ship wrecks, breaking oil pipelines, and displacing huge volumes of sand on the seabed.
How do you solve a problem like Maria?
We might have to do this song and dance again.The models are starting to take Jose dying off quicker than expected into account. Seeing way more hits to the Carolina's and a select few showing Florida hits now.
I really don't like how similar this is looking to Irma.
I get that referenceHow do you solve a problem like Maria?
If i had a anxiety attack over Irma and the eye did not even hit me in aguadilla.....jesus fucking christ.
Oh nice. I live near the 110, really close to San Antonio.
12z Euro just started. Let's see what it does after the GFS shifted west and the UKMet shifted east.
What sucks about about a cat4 hitting PR as opposed to the Florida Keys is....PR residents can't evacuate. If PR residents could evacuate, the weather service would be sending out tweets like this to get residents to evacuate. 3,500,000 people live on the island
PR wouldn't be completely underwater like the Keys.
PRs infrastructure however is not as good as that of Florida, nor do they have easy access to help from the main land if the infrastructure collapses(it probably will). Add to that the high potential of flooding, mudslides and violent surge... You get the picture.
All of them are on CRACK. I would say throw all of the models away past day 4.. Euro has Jose as a well defined tropical system with a great eye on simulated Infrared on day 6(Hell somehow Jose intensifies on this run lol).. Jose won't last 2 days let alone 6.
Too much uncertenty this far out.. We will have a much better picture Wednesday once it is past PR in regards to its track past the islands after the models take into account a non existent Jose.
Seems like we were here just two weeks ago. Irma into New York. Irma into DC. Irma into the Carolinas. The trend south and west each day until it zeroed in on Florida. I'm really not looking forward to going through this shit again. Supply chains are still stressed and not really fully recovered. Shelves for canned goods are still not fully stocked. Grabbed a few packs of water from Costco today just in case.
Seems like we were here just two weeks ago. Irma into New York. Irma into DC. Irma into the Carolinas. The trend south and west each day until it zeroed in on Florida. I'm really not looking forward to going through this shit again. Supply chains are still stressed and not really fully recovered. Shelves for canned goods are still not fully stocked. Grabbed a few packs of water from Costco today just in case.
I would say don't worry about the track to the US Mainland until at least Thursday to be honest. There won't be any certainty or at least somewhat certainty until then.
Right now with the effects of what there is of Jose left has created a real mess in the long range track. Anything past 4 days is hot garbage right now.
Maria now a cat 4 at 130 MPH. Somewhat surprised she's only that, given that the system has looked even more impressive since the 2pm update.
5:00 PM AST Mon Sep 18
Location: 15.1°N 60.7°W
Moving: WNW at 9 mph
Min pressure: 950 mb
Max sustained: 130 mph
FORECAST POSITIONS AND MAX WINDS
INIT 18/2100Z 15.1N 60.7W 115 KT 130 MPH
12H 19/0600Z 15.7N 61.9W 125 KT 145 MPH
24H 19/1800Z 16.5N 63.3W 135 KT 155 MPH
36H 20/0600Z 17.3N 64.7W 135 KT 155 MPH
48H 20/1800Z 18.2N 66.2W 130 KT 150 MPH...OVER PUERTO RICO
72H 21/1800Z 20.0N 69.0W 125 KT 145 MPH...OVER WATER
96H 22/1800Z 22.0N 71.5W 120 KT 140 MPH
120H 23/1800Z 25.0N 73.0W 105 KT 120 MPH
Speaking of Jose it's possible it pulls a Nadine 2012 where it goes post-tropical and regenerates as a tropical storm since it's likely the shear hammering the storm right now will weaken if it starts moving southward a few days from now. The current NHC forecast shows it dipping southward again as a post-tropical storm a few days from now.
Also some models are starting to show Maria and whatever remains of Jose merging or dancing around each other like a week from now.
Of the massive, high-powered computer models run by governments and institutions to forecast hurricanes, the vaunted European model had the best performance during Irma. But theres a little-known entity that preliminary data show outperformed the European model as well as the others.
Enter Panasonic, the electronics company best known for making televisions.
Panasonic has a subgroup in its aviation division, known as Panasonic Avionics, that works on a weather model. The models foundation is based on the National Weather Services well-known Global Forecast System model, often referred to as the American model.
But the Panasonic model is beefed up with additional data, not incorporated into the GFS, that may be helping it produce even more accurate forecasts. Panasonic gained access to this valuable data after acquiring AirDat in 2013, a company that engineers instruments aboard commercial jets that gather weather data.
On balance, forecast data released by Panasonic reveals its forecasts were the most accurate leading up to Irmas landfall on Marco Island, Fla. (Note that this forecast data, provided by Panasonic, has not been independently evaluated. But Panasonic has posted the data online and welcomes scholars to review it.)
Damn you guys are really scaring me with this cat 5 talk
Martinique here (just south of Dominica). Shit is getting real.
What is incredible is how fast this went from Cat 1 to Cat 4 right now.
The worse should be in a few hours, and we're lucky we will likely not in the eye trajectory...
Dominica is going to get obliterated like the Virgin Islands. Direct hit is imminent in the next few hours.Martinique here (just south of Dominica). Shit is getting real.
What is incredible is how fast this went from Cat 1 to Cat 4 right now.
The worse should be in a few hours, and we're lucky we will likely not in the eye trajectory...