Thursday, August 24, 2006

Invest 97L - Now TD 5 - Now Ernesto

Something is brewing in the Windwards. This could be trouble. Or it could fizzle like every other storm this year.

From the National Hurricane Center:

A STRONG TROPICAL WAVE IS MOVING THROUGH THE WINDWARD ISLANDS...ACCOMPANIED BY SUSTAINED WINDS OF 35 TO 40 MPH AND HEAVY RAINS INSQUALLS. SATELLITE IMAGES AND SURFACE REPORTS SUGGEST THAT THESYSTEM HAS NOT YET ACQUIRED A WELL-DEFINED CENTER OF CIRCULATION. AN AIR FORCE RESERVE UNIT RECONNAISSANCE AIRCRAFT WILL INVESTIGATETHE WAVE EARLY THIS AFTERNOON. THIS SYSTEM HAS THE POTENTIAL TOBECOME A TROPICAL DEPRESSION OR TROPICAL STORM LATER TODAY ORTONIGHT. REGARDLESS OF WHETHER OR NOT THE WAVE BECOMES A TROPICALCYCLONE...TROPICAL STORM CONDITIONS WILL CONTINUE TO AFFECTPORTIONS OF THE WINDWARD ISLANDS THROUGH TONIGHT.

Update: Invest 97L is now Tropical Depression 5. It could very well become tropical storm Ernesto in the next 24 hours. Stay tuned.

Update II: Yep, his name is now Ernesto and although he's getting sheared a bit right off the Cuban coast, he looks to be a bad 'un. The scary part is almost all the models agree he will enter the gulf and hit somewhere on the Florida coast. The REALLY scary part is I just checked the temperatures in the Gulf and it's hot right now. Damned hot. Let's hope the mountains of Cuba shred the thing because if it get's in the loop current, things could get really frightening really fast.

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