2024 Hurricane Season Discussion

[869MB]

Hurricane Katrina's first rodeo
Back in August of 2005, South Florida was struck by a hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph. The storm made landfall near the border of Miami-Dade and Broward Counties. It killed 14 and caused the 2024 equivalent of $1 billion in damage. It was Hurricane Katrina, and while the storm is obviously remembered for the horror it inflicted on the Gulf Coast, Katrina's first act was to catch South Florida a bit off-guard. Katrina dumped 10 to 20 inches of rain and knocked out power to about 1.5 million Floridians.

.
Katrina intensified from about a 50 mph tropical storm to an 80 mph hurricane in the 24 hours leading up to landfall in South Florida. By the time it re-emerged into the Gulf of Mexico, it had only lost a bit of intensity. You can view a great radar loop from Brian McNoldy's archive here, and you can see how the storm really got its act together right at landfall.There have been numerous category one hurricanes that have hit land over the years. Yes, most are generally well-behaved. Most cause some damage but not exceptionally long-term disruption. Katrina bucked this trend somewhat, and early this month, Beryl did the same for Houston.

During Katrina, winds gusted to 97 mph in Homestead, 94 mph in Virginia Key, 82 mph in Fort Lauderdale, and 78 mph in Miami. During Beryl, winds gusted to 97 mph just near Freeport, 85 mph in Angleton, 78 mph in Galveston, 84 mph at Hobby Airport, 83 mph at Bush Airport, and 89 mph at the University of Houston. In some ways, Katrina and Beryl make for a nice case study of like-minded category ones. And they also blow away the myth of "it's only a category one."

The usefulness of the Saffir-Simpson Scale

For hurricanes, we've long relied on the Saffir-Simpson scale to guide us in terms of the definitive categorization of intensity.


The Saffir-Simpson Scale (NOAA)
It's a great tool for bucketing hurricanes in terms of their strength. Category 5 storms like first ballot hall of famers Andrew, Camille, and Michael generally fit the idea of the scale nicely. It tends to work even better when you consider "major" hurricanes, those that are category 3 and higher. The vast majority of memorable, devastating storms will fall into those buckets.

The uselessness of the Saffir-Simpson Scale

While the scale has true scientific value, many disparate voices within the meteorology and social science communities and beyond have long argued that the Saffir-Simpson Scale falls short in conveying the true threat to the public from a given hurricane. Think about Hurricane Harvey. It was a category 4 hurricane with massive damage on the Middle Texas Coast. By the time it arrived in Houston, it was a tropical storm, but it produced arguably the worst flooding event in Texas history. Hurricane Agnes in 1972 was only a category 1 storm but ended up being the costliest hurricane in American history at the time. The Saffir-Simpson scale, for all its usefulness is based on one variable and one variable only: Maximum sustained wind. If you have a 25 mile radius of hurricane winds that hit 155 mph winds, you have a category 4 hurricane. Whereas a storm like Hurricane Sandy before it was classified as extratropical was "only" a category 1 storm with 85 to 90 mph winds but had a wind field that sent hurricane winds out 175 miles from the center. Which storm is capable of more damage? Or are they capable of equal damage?

Thankfully, most meteorologists recognize this and tend to focus on the impacts more than the category of the storm.

Beryl came in like a wrecking ball
This brings us to Beryl. Right off the top here, let me explain some Matt philosophy for you. Prior to Beryl, Matt believed that things would generally be fine in Houston during category 1 or 2 hurricanes because once they arrived in the city, we'd have gusty winds, some power outages, and scattered damage. But overall, we'd get back up on our feet rather quickly. I even basically said as much literally a few hours before Beryl's eyewall moved into Houston.


Preliminary peak wind gust and direction map for Beryl. (Jay Shafer/DisasterTech)
Yes, we did see the forecast 40 to 80 mph wind gusts, but it was more like 60 to 90 mph over the entire metro area. I believed we'd fair well, given that Hurricane Ike, a much larger and somewhat stronger storm in 2008 knocked out power to 2 million customers for up to 2 weeks, even though most of the Houston metro experienced the western (weaker) side. I figured, Beryl, smaller, weaker, but the dirty side...we'll have outages and some damage, but we'll manage.

Sustained winds were higher during Ike, but wind gusts in Beryl came up to basically match some of those sustained winds.


Hurricane Ike sustained winds in 2008 ranged from 60 to 90 mph, much higher than in Beryl though wind gusts did get to those levels as well. (NOAA)
Here we are comparing a category 1 relatively compact hurricane to a category 2 unwieldy, large hurricane.

Why did Beryl match Ike's scope of power outages despite being a weaker storm? First, the track put Houston on the stronger side, so most of the metro area saw the eyewall of Beryl and the strongest winds. Second, and this is where our expectations probably failed us most: Ike was weakening on approach to Texas. Beryl was entering rapid intensification. Beryl was only slightly weaker when it arrived in Houston as it was on the coast. Ike was about 110 mph at landfall and 95 mph once in Houston. Beryl was 80 mph at landfall and 75 mph once in Houston.

It barely weakened. Why? I think there are two reasons. First, Beryl while undergoing rapid intensification up to landfall took some time to unwind. There is absolutely a difference between a hurricane ramping up at landfall and one that is already decelerating. My new philosophy on this will be to add a category of wind impacts to a storm that is intensifying up to landfall. Second, Beryl was traveling over an area that had seen about 200 to 400 percent of normal rainfall over the prior week.


Percent of normal rainfall between June 30th and July 7th, right before Beryl arrived. (NOAA)
For Houston and points south, basically right on Beryl's track, we had very soggy ground. This likely contributed both to Beryl maintaining intensity and the wind damage it caused. Trees fall more easily on saturated ground. Could there be an element of brown ocean effect at play here, where hurricanes can maintain intensity over land? Maybe, but that's a longer-term research project.

There's certainly an argument to be made about whether or not the power infrastructure in the Houston area is underprepared for the true threat this region faces. After Katrina hit Miami in 2005, 90 percent of customers had power back within three days. Three days after Beryl, about 58 percent of customers were back online in Houston. I don't want to use this post to assign blame or recommend what should be done, but given that a category one or stronger storm can hit Texas every other year or so on average, this is probably an area that should be a wake up call. Texas should be attempting to match Florida, which has done great work in the hurricane resiliency space, between power restoration and building codes, despite some occasional hurdles.

Most importantly, I want this post to convey that there is honestly no such thing as "only a category one" hurricane or "only a tropical storm." While classifying storms is good from a scientific standpoint after the fact, it's not always great science communication in real-time. This was certainly a wake up call for me, and I hope it will be for others that the only thing that matters in each unique storm is what the impacts will be. And hopefully we can convey them in an understandable way to folks here in Texas and elsewhere as our site grows across the Gulf and Atlantic.

My new philosophy on this will be to add a category of wind impacts to a storm that is intensifying up to landfall.

I didn't get a chance to post much before or during Hurricane Beryl but I did mention this as being one of my concerns before Beryl regained strength in the Gulf. I specifically used Hurricane Hugo as an example of an intensifying storm having the impact of a higher category storm when you take in consideration its forward speed, though I know Hugo is an extreme example of this.

Second, and this is where our expectations probably failed us most: Ike was weakening on approach to Texas. Beryl was entering rapid intensification.

This is simply not accurate at all. Hurricane Ike was indeed ramping up in intensity as it approached the Texas Coastline. If you analyze the radar loop, you can see the eye-wall contracting as it made landfall. As a matter of fact, I remember there was a great deal of debate back then as Ike made landfall whether or not it should have been upgraded to a Category 3 hurricane - I think there may have been some electronic issues with the final recon flights as well if I'm not mistaken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMYzeFL_SpQ

Just an FYI, this was not my write up. This was Matt Lanza at the Eyewall.

Oh yeah I definitely know it was Matt who said that. I'm just a little shocked he would state that when it was obvious Ike was not weakening upon landfall.

[tireman4]

From the Eyewall...


Calm continues a little longer
The tropics continue to look pretty quiet over the next week or so, with no areas worth watching at this time.

Calendar flips into more action?
As we head into August, as we've been warning, it does look like the dam will begin to break, slowly at first but with perhaps more voracity as August progresses.

Yesterday afternoon's week 2 and 3 outlook from the Climate Prediction Center do highlight the Atlantic for tropical potential north of 20 percent.


The week 2-3 tropical hazards outlook from the Climate Prediction Center highlight the western Atlantic and Caribbean through mid-August for possible development. (NOAA CPC)
This makes sense on a couple levels. As we noted the other day, it does look like a more favorable "background state" is on the way to the Atlantic basin. Additionally, there is some "buzz" in the modeling looking toward the Bahamas late next week or weekend. The Euro has been on this one for a bit, with the operational model guidance periodically showing something, including at midday today. The ensemble guidance is much less enthusiastic about this, as you can see from the 00z European EPS looking at the IQR difference map from Tomer Burg's excellent site.


The Euro ensemble IQR difference, which indicates ensemble spread is pretty calm for later next week, with only about 5 or 6 of the 51 ensemble members even showing low pressure. (Tomer Burg)
This really lacks much support from elsewhere at this time. The GFS and its ensemble generally shows little in this region. Even the ICON (for now), which tends to overforecast in the tropics but nailed Beryl in the Gulf doesn't have a particularly strong signal. That said, wind shear looks relatively modest next week. However, dry air may be in plentiful supply around the area with significant dust in the basin right now, which would limit development. I would say that I can understand modeling picking up on this area for possible development, but I do not necessarily think this merits significant concern at the moment. We've got some time, so let's continue to watch for an uptick in showers and storms in the Bahamas late next week or weekend.

Elsewhere, we continue to see hints of more aggressive change later in August, with European weekly data now showing above normal tropical activity by late month. Not much else we can say at this point, except to make sure you've got your season preps complete or soon to be completed as we white knuckle our way into later August.

[Scott747]

Scott747 maybe like an imelda last second wrap up? No TS but kinda similar situation where a low briefly closes off before moving inland

Nah. Imelda had a little better environment to organize. This situation never looked that promising.

Meanwhile the 12z Euro is the third run in a row to show a potential system organizing as it approaches S. Fla/Keys and Cuba in the very long range. Getting to that time of year where the long range modeling should begin to show an uptick.

[Ptarmigan]

Hurricane Katrina's first rodeo
Back in August of 2005, South Florida was struck by a hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph. The storm made landfall near the border of Miami-Dade and Broward Counties. It killed 14 and caused the 2024 equivalent of $1 billion in damage. It was Hurricane Katrina, and while the storm is obviously remembered for the horror it inflicted on the Gulf Coast, Katrina's first act was to catch South Florida a bit off-guard. Katrina dumped 10 to 20 inches of rain and knocked out power to about 1.5 million Floridians.

.
Katrina intensified from about a 50 mph tropical storm to an 80 mph hurricane in the 24 hours leading up to landfall in South Florida. By the time it re-emerged into the Gulf of Mexico, it had only lost a bit of intensity. You can view a great radar loop from Brian McNoldy's archive here, and you can see how the storm really got its act together right at landfall.There have been numerous category one hurricanes that have hit land over the years. Yes, most are generally well-behaved. Most cause some damage but not exceptionally long-term disruption. Katrina bucked this trend somewhat, and early this month, Beryl did the same for Houston.

During Katrina, winds gusted to 97 mph in Homestead, 94 mph in Virginia Key, 82 mph in Fort Lauderdale, and 78 mph in Miami. During Beryl, winds gusted to 97 mph just near Freeport, 85 mph in Angleton, 78 mph in Galveston, 84 mph at Hobby Airport, 83 mph at Bush Airport, and 89 mph at the University of Houston. In some ways, Katrina and Beryl make for a nice case study of like-minded category ones. And they also blow away the myth of "it's only a category one."

The usefulness of the Saffir-Simpson Scale

For hurricanes, we've long relied on the Saffir-Simpson scale to guide us in terms of the definitive categorization of intensity.


The Saffir-Simpson Scale (NOAA)
It's a great tool for bucketing hurricanes in terms of their strength. Category 5 storms like first ballot hall of famers Andrew, Camille, and Michael generally fit the idea of the scale nicely. It tends to work even better when you consider "major" hurricanes, those that are category 3 and higher. The vast majority of memorable, devastating storms will fall into those buckets.

The uselessness of the Saffir-Simpson Scale

While the scale has true scientific value, many disparate voices within the meteorology and social science communities and beyond have long argued that the Saffir-Simpson Scale falls short in conveying the true threat to the public from a given hurricane. Think about Hurricane Harvey. It was a category 4 hurricane with massive damage on the Middle Texas Coast. By the time it arrived in Houston, it was a tropical storm, but it produced arguably the worst flooding event in Texas history. Hurricane Agnes in 1972 was only a category 1 storm but ended up being the costliest hurricane in American history at the time. The Saffir-Simpson scale, for all its usefulness is based on one variable and one variable only: Maximum sustained wind. If you have a 25 mile radius of hurricane winds that hit 155 mph winds, you have a category 4 hurricane. Whereas a storm like Hurricane Sandy before it was classified as extratropical was "only" a category 1 storm with 85 to 90 mph winds but had a wind field that sent hurricane winds out 175 miles from the center. Which storm is capable of more damage? Or are they capable of equal damage?

Thankfully, most meteorologists recognize this and tend to focus on the impacts more than the category of the storm.

Beryl came in like a wrecking ball
This brings us to Beryl. Right off the top here, let me explain some Matt philosophy for you. Prior to Beryl, Matt believed that things would generally be fine in Houston during category 1 or 2 hurricanes because once they arrived in the city, we'd have gusty winds, some power outages, and scattered damage. But overall, we'd get back up on our feet rather quickly. I even basically said as much literally a few hours before Beryl's eyewall moved into Houston.


Preliminary peak wind gust and direction map for Beryl. (Jay Shafer/DisasterTech)
Yes, we did see the forecast 40 to 80 mph wind gusts, but it was more like 60 to 90 mph over the entire metro area. I believed we'd fair well, given that Hurricane Ike, a much larger and somewhat stronger storm in 2008 knocked out power to 2 million customers for up to 2 weeks, even though most of the Houston metro experienced the western (weaker) side. I figured, Beryl, smaller, weaker, but the dirty side...we'll have outages and some damage, but we'll manage.

Sustained winds were higher during Ike, but wind gusts in Beryl came up to basically match some of those sustained winds.


Hurricane Ike sustained winds in 2008 ranged from 60 to 90 mph, much higher than in Beryl though wind gusts did get to those levels as well. (NOAA)
Here we are comparing a category 1 relatively compact hurricane to a category 2 unwieldy, large hurricane.

Why did Beryl match Ike's scope of power outages despite being a weaker storm? First, the track put Houston on the stronger side, so most of the metro area saw the eyewall of Beryl and the strongest winds. Second, and this is where our expectations probably failed us most: Ike was weakening on approach to Texas. Beryl was entering rapid intensification. Beryl was only slightly weaker when it arrived in Houston as it was on the coast. Ike was about 110 mph at landfall and 95 mph once in Houston. Beryl was 80 mph at landfall and 75 mph once in Houston.

It barely weakened. Why? I think there are two reasons. First, Beryl while undergoing rapid intensification up to landfall took some time to unwind. There is absolutely a difference between a hurricane ramping up at landfall and one that is already decelerating. My new philosophy on this will be to add a category of wind impacts to a storm that is intensifying up to landfall. Second, Beryl was traveling over an area that had seen about 200 to 400 percent of normal rainfall over the prior week.


Percent of normal rainfall between June 30th and July 7th, right before Beryl arrived. (NOAA)
For Houston and points south, basically right on Beryl's track, we had very soggy ground. This likely contributed both to Beryl maintaining intensity and the wind damage it caused. Trees fall more easily on saturated ground. Could there be an element of brown ocean effect at play here, where hurricanes can maintain intensity over land? Maybe, but that's a longer-term research project.

There's certainly an argument to be made about whether or not the power infrastructure in the Houston area is underprepared for the true threat this region faces. After Katrina hit Miami in 2005, 90 percent of customers had power back within three days. Three days after Beryl, about 58 percent of customers were back online in Houston. I don't want to use this post to assign blame or recommend what should be done, but given that a category one or stronger storm can hit Texas every other year or so on average, this is probably an area that should be a wake up call. Texas should be attempting to match Florida, which has done great work in the hurricane resiliency space, between power restoration and building codes, despite some occasional hurdles.

Most importantly, I want this post to convey that there is honestly no such thing as "only a category one" hurricane or "only a tropical storm." While classifying storms is good from a scientific standpoint after the fact, it's not always great science communication in real-time. This was certainly a wake up call for me, and I hope it will be for others that the only thing that matters in each unique storm is what the impacts will be. And hopefully we can convey them in an understandable way to folks here in Texas and elsewhere as our site grows across the Gulf and Atlantic.

My new philosophy on this will be to add a category of wind impacts to a storm that is intensifying up to landfall.

I didn't get a chance to post much before or during Hurricane Beryl but I did mention this as being one of my concerns before Beryl regained strength in the Gulf. I specifically used Hurricane Hugo as an example of an intensifying storm having the impact of a higher category storm when you take in consideration its forward speed, though I know Hugo is an extreme example of this.

Second, and this is where our expectations probably failed us most: Ike was weakening on approach to Texas. Beryl was entering rapid intensification.

This is simply not accurate at all. Hurricane Ike was indeed ramping up in intensity as it approached the Texas Coastline. If you analyze the radar loop, you can see the eye-wall contracting as it made landfall. As a matter of fact, I remember there was a great deal of debate back then as Ike made landfall whether or not it should have been upgraded to a Category 3 hurricane - I think there may have been some electronic issues with the final recon flights as well if I'm not mistaken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMYzeFL_SpQ

I suspect Hurricane Ike could of been a Category 3 at landfall. I remember Ike was intensifying upon landfall. It was tightening and becoming more circular as it approached Texas.

https://www.weather.gov/hgx/projects_ik ... d_analysis

b. Wind Analysis Compared to Doppler Velocities

The wind analyses from HRD provide rough information about the structure of Hurricane Ike in regards to its wind fields.Figure 1 shows the wind analysis of Ike at 0430 UTC 13 September (1130PM CDT, 12 September). Ike is still in the Gulf of Mexico. The strongest band of winds stretches across the NE quadrant to the SE and SW quadrants of the storm. Interesting to note is that stronger winds exist in the southern part of the eye when compared to the northern part of the storm. This indicates that Hurricane Ike was possibly stronger over the southern portion of the storm versus the northern part of the storm. The analysis at this time indicates maximum winds of 85 knots or 98 mph which is the low end of Category 2 on the Saffir-Simpson Scale. This wind maximum was located mainly on the east side of the hurricane.

Doppler velocity data from the NWS Houston/Galveston WSR-88D is consistent with the analysis as well. The velocity data of Ike mainly resolves the northern and western parts of Ike as the southeast quadrant is out of the radar's range. As figure 2 shows, there is a band of winds around 90 to 105 knots (105-120 mph) in this part of the storm. At first glance, this seems to indicate much stronger winds in Hurricane Ike than the analysis shows. This is mainly due to the radar sampling winds about 1000 to 3000 feet above ground level since the radar beam bends upward with distance from the radar. This means that a reduction factor needs to be applied to these winds to get an estimate of the surface winds in these areas. Based on studies by the National Hurricane Center, a 30% reduction will be applied in line with table 1 from NHC's discussion. The NHC discussion also indicates that the hurricane's strongest winds are typically strongest at elevations of 1000 to 2000 feet. This should give a good indication of the maximum winds in these parts of the hurricane. Applying the reduction yields winds at the surface of 63-74 knots (73-85 mph) in the western and northern parts of Ike at this time. The values seem to match well with HRD's analysis at this time, but may be a little less than the wind analysis near the western and northern eye wall of Ike.

[Cpv17]

0z EPS is pretty interesting.

[tireman4]

In addition to this tropical wave, which has seen an increase in support among model guidance, there's indication for a more active monsoon trough in the next 7-10 days, as lower level westerlies dominate the Tropical Atlantic. https://t.co/ksaQigIBNL pic.twitter.com/su4geUDy0I
-- Danny Morris (@dmorris9661) July 26, 2024

[tireman4]

Sea Surface Temperatures 07 26 24

[tireman4]

Global Tropics Hazards Outlook

[Stratton20]

CMC starting to see development just like the euro, has a weak low trying to close off in the western gulf in 10 days, GFS trending that way too, more amplified/ sharper wave axis

[tireman4]

The Eyewall


Headlines

Quiet for the next 5 days in the Atlantic.
Continuing to watch a potential tropical wave later next week in the Western Atlantic.
Watching the next wave
Hello from 35,000 feet! Just scoping out the atmosphere on my way back to the Gulf Coast. Anyway, let’s take a look at what’s doing in the tropics heading into another summer weekend

The National Hurricane Center has a clean outlook map for the next 7 days across the Atlantic. There has been some noise coming from some models for this wave in the far eastern Atlantic today.


A tropical wave in the far eastern Atlantic off Africa is getting some models enthused about tropical development later next week. (RadarScope)
The wave is currently in an atmosphere that is dominated by dust. Or at least the road in front of it is. As the wave approaches the Caribbean or southwest Atlantic later next week, it will have some dry air to fend off. The forecast from last night’s European model shows this rather well. I’m using this to illustrate what the environment may be like when it gets to that general location, not where I think it will specifically be or what it will exactly look like. So take this with a grain of salt. Or Saharan dust.


A look at where the eastern Atlantic wave could be next week, primarily focusing on the environment it’s in. Dry air and at least some wind shear will likely be in place. (Tropical Tidbits)
So yeah, this probably bears a bit of watching. But there is nothing to say that this will definitely develop into something yet. Ensemble support for this is growing somewhat, though again, no models really shoot this to the moon yet. Still, with a tropical wave in a marginally favorable environment in early August, I will at least continue to watch this.


Ensemble modeling from the Euro model earlier this morning shows lukewarm but meaningful support for something existing in the western Atlantic later next week. We will watch. (Weathernerds.org)
Outside of that, we continue to watch for the August increase. There are no other specific concerns we see at this time. Let’s check back in on this tomorrow or Sunday.

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CategoriesDaily Outlooks
TagsAtlantic, August, Bahamas, tropical wave
Signs of the Atlantic calm slowly breaking in early August
1 thought on “A quiet weekend for us, but some hints of development in the Atlantic next week”

[tireman4]

000
ABNT20 KNHC 261728
TWOAT

Tropical Weather Outlook
NWS National Hurricane Center Miami FL
200 PM EDT Fri Jul 26 2024

For the North Atlantic...Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico:

Near the Lesser and Greater Antilles:
An area of disturbed weather over the central tropical Atlantic
Ocean is expected to interact with an approaching tropical wave
during the next several days. Some development of this system will
be possible while it approaches the Lesser Antilles during the
early to middle part of next week and moves generally
west-northwestward near the Greater Antilles toward the latter part
of the week.
* Formation chance through 48 hours...low...near 0 percent.
* Formation chance through 7 days...low...20 percent.

$$
Forecaster Berg

[Scott747]

Scott747 maybe like an imelda last second wrap up? No TS but kinda similar situation where a low briefly closes off before moving inland

Nah. Imelda had a little better environment to organize. This situation never looked that promising.

Meanwhile the 12z Euro is the third run in a row to show a potential system organizing as it approaches S. Fla/Keys and Cuba in the very long range. Getting to that time of year where the long range modeling should begin to show an uptick.

Well looks like our little 'breather' from tracking anything is going to come to a quick end.

Operational Euro and ensembles have continued to show some energy getting into the Gulf.

18z GFS has joined the party and has kept the energy across the Caribbean with organization as it nears the nw Caribbean and into a strong hurricane across the Golden Triangle in the long range.

[Stratton20]

Scott747 and then it just stalls it out over se texas, thankfully its the long range though

[Pas_Bon]

I officially want my mommy now

[Pas_Bon]

Uncle! Uncle!
Pre-emptively calling Uncle.

[tireman4]

Items to watch

[sambucol]

I saw a map of a high sitting over Texas. Is that high supposed to move?

[Stratton20]

It could, as a new weakness looks to develop between the ridges as we move into late next week, right now im not overly concerned about a threat to texas as the steering pattern showing in the models, would favor an eastern gulf to SE US coast track, a lot can change for sure, but for now im not really concerned about it

[DoctorMu]

Scott747 maybe like an imelda last second wrap up? No TS but kinda similar situation where a low briefly closes off before moving inland

Nah. Imelda had a little better environment to organize. This situation never looked that promising.

Meanwhile the 12z Euro is the third run in a row to show a potential system organizing as it approaches S. Fla/Keys and Cuba in the very long range. Getting to that time of year where the long range modeling should begin to show an uptick.

Well looks like our little 'breather' from tracking anything is going to come to a quick end.

Operational Euro and ensembles have continued to show some energy getting into the Gulf.

18z GFS has joined the party and has kept the energy across the Caribbean with organization as it nears the nw Caribbean and into a strong hurricane across the Golden Triangle in the long range.

GFS: Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Nothing - last 4 runs.

This *feels* like an eastern Gulf marauder. How strong and where - who knows.

[DoctorMu]

It could, as a new weakness looks to develop between the ridges as we move into late next week, right now im not overly concerned about a threat to texas as the steering pattern showing in the models, would favor an eastern gulf to SE US coast track, a lot can change for sure, but for now im not really concerned about it

The ridge will be south of us and weaksauce, but enough for a more northerly track if I had to wager.