STORM2K

Wishing in one hand and wiping the sweat off my brow with the other.

Climo says we should be quickly transitioning out of the rainy season here in west central florida but the weather says otherwise as it looks like a classic July like Tampa bay slam is on the docket this evening. Looking beyond today the CPC says torch city as far as the eye can see. I expect we're going to stack up some late season 90 degree days as we head into October.

FL has always gotten hot summer like weather into October. It's FL.

We just can't fire up any convection down here on the SE coast. The easterly flow isn't even that strong.....there's barely any breeze out right now.

We must be in one of those depressing multi-week patterns where the easterly flow is just strong enough to push anything away, yet not strong enough to bring us streamers or outflow boundaries from Bahamian convection. Just sun all day long with the odd passing cumulus cloud. I hate it.

Patrick99 wrote:We just can't fire up any convection down here on the SE coast. The easterly flow isn't even that strong.....there's barely any breeze out right now.

We must be in one of those depressing multi-week patterns where the easterly flow is just strong enough to push anything away, yet not strong enough to bring us streamers or outflow boundaries from Bahamian convection. Just sun all day long with the odd passing cumulus cloud. I hate it.

I feel for ya. Rainy season is coming to an end soon would be nice to top it off with some storms for some temporary heat relief.
Seems us here on the west coast are making up for an on and off storm season we had here.

95 record breaking degrees today is the hottest it has been since...yesterday. When the numbers are added up for this September it is destined to stand on a stage all its own.

Interesting quip from the late morning NWS JAX AFD:

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Jacksonville FL
953 AM EDT Tue Sep 25 2018

.UPDATE...
High pressure to the north of the area will continue the persistent
easterly (dare I say trade wind like?) flow across the area yet
again today.

Easterly flow looking like trade winds...are we becoming more tropical up here?

Last night it felt like a July summer evening, at 9 PM it was still 84 degrees with seabreeze thunderstorms still going over western Orange County with a nice night time lightning & thunder show over metro Orlando. No real end in sight in a pattern change to Fall. Might as well go to the Atlantic beach this weekend where surf temps are in the mid 80s thanks to no upwelling
BTW, it is sad that the red tide is still causing problems all the way up to Pinellas County. My sister who leaves in lower St Pete sent me pictures of their canal, dead baby sting rays floating around, even a baby hammer head.

I'm beginning to see consistent hints that a stronger surface gradient out of the east will begin between Monday and Tuesday. This compliments of a large building surface high over the N.E. Conus. That should bring some of you "East Coasters" some added diurnal showers that you've been asking for. All around I think this will temper the hot day time temps by a few degrees as well, something that all of us wouldn't mind. Whether or not we'll see a strong enough easterly flow to help push out some of those red tide conditions still afflicting the W. Coast, I don't really know. Beyond the increased easterly flow at the surface, our overall summer pattern seems to be largely controlled by the persistent mid to upper level high that just feels that it's found a home over the Southeast U.S. Until that breaks down or a significant shift in the long wave pattern occurs, the closest we're gonna get to a cold front paying us a visit seems to be another big high well to the north causing our surface flow to back to the Northeast. Maybe the pattern will shift some in 2-3 weeks.....?

September of 2018 is in the running for the hottest month ever at Tampa. Should that happen it would displace June of 1985 which featured the all time high of 99. I do wonder the extent to which development around the airport may be skewing temps higher but there's no question the recent heat is simply exceptional. decreasing solar insolation will eventually force the heat to relent but in the interim...the summer swim season is destined to be extended a bit longer.

Thunderstorms last night just east of downtown St. Petersburg near Vinoy Park produced pea size hail and downburst winds to 50 mph. Lots of rain and street flooding along north shore drive.
For today:
Lots of low level moisture, and an upper level low southeast of me would favor storms along sea breeze convergence boundaries. Mid level water vapor shows a large tongue of dry air moving towards me. Either this dry air kills off precipitation or the convergence causes storms to reach into the dry air where evaporation due to the dry air on the flanks lead to cooling and thus enhanced downdrafts and give me strong winds with the thunderstorms. The ULL may also aid in this instability. Long story short gonna be an interesting afternoon.

-storm watcher Navin
I live for big storms

Sounds like you had a good storm in St. Pete. Don't get much of that down here in broward. Might get a little backdoor dew front next week. I'm hoping for any humidity drop for a day.

Early next week, high builds southward across the peninsula pushing
a backdoor cold front towards the region. This will also bring
an increase in moisture content for another round of showers and
thunderstorms Tuesday into Wednesday afternoon. This would have a
minor affect on temperatures, but would bring some lower dew points
to the area, with models indicating dew points in the low 70s by
Wednesday. Drier air across the Atlantic will make its way into
the peninsula by the end of the next week limiting the potential
for rain, keeping breeze easterly flow in place and heating up
temps into the 90s once again across S FL.

Since the end of August in Port Saint Lucie West I've had a couple overnight low grade T storms but almost nothing to speak of during the day. Drying out Big League.

Tampa Airport Just hit 96- Tying the record for all time hottest september day- at the end of the month too!!

97 at KTPA breaks the all time high for September. Drier air aloft helped accomplish this incredible month end feat as surface dews fell into the upper 60's. Went swimming in the Gulf today. water is crystal clear and exceptionally warm by late September standards. No traces of red tide and bait fish and marine life are plentiful. With a tightening gradient developing over the state in the coming days I expect the red tide to get the boot and finally diminish.

Oops we just did it again. (KTPA at 97) and once again the number is an outlier although it is stupid hot out. I am seriously wondering why the obs at KTPA are so damn hot. they've been running high for a long time and I'm beginning to view them as suspect. nevertheless the beach looks far better than the Bucs today

Gainesville, FL, with records back to 1890, absolutely obliterates the all-time warmest Sep record with its 83.5!! The next hottest of 1925 was way down at 82.2! This month also ties August for the hottest of 2018. The lowest of the month was only down to 71, which makes it the warmest lowest for any Sep. back to 1890. The old record was 69.

It is no wonder why SSTs near the SE US are near August normals, which is a reason to watch the tropics extra closely due to this extra fuel. We're going into early October with nearby SSTs likely as warm as they've ever been on record in early Oct. Often in October, especially N FL northward along the east coast or Big Bend to the N Gulf coast there will be slight weakening just before landfall just due to shelf-waters being cooler vs further offshore. With still no significant cooling in sight, the shelf-waters don't look to cool much, if any, over the next 2 weeks other than perhaps in localized areas. There may still be August-like SSTs going into mid-October!

It's nice to see some local bay area mets are finally beginning to question the obs coming out of Tampa international airport. I've long viewed them as suspect now bordering on absurd. In such an observation rich environment I wonder why persistent statistical outliers were roundly accepted absent question. Now long overdue questions are being asked and hopefully someone digs up some answers and fixes whatever may be inaccurate. If you believe the obs (I'm now firmly in the "don't believe/something's wrong" camp) today's high of 96 breaks the all time high for October.

LarryWx wrote:Gainesville, FL, with records back to 1890, absolutely obliterates the all-time warmest Sep record with its 83.5!! The next hottest of 1925 was way down at 82.2! This month also ties August for the hottest of 2018. The lowest of the month was only down to 71, which makes it the warmest lowest for any Sep. back to 1890. The old record was 69.

It is no wonder why SSTs near the SE US are near August normals, which is a reason to watch the tropics extra closely due to this extra fuel. We're going into early October with nearby SSTs likely as warm as they've ever been on record in early Oct. Often in October, especially N FL northward along the east coast or Big Bend to the N Gulf coast there will be slight weakening just before landfall just due to shelf-waters being cooler vs further offshore. With still no significant cooling in sight, the shelf-waters don't look to cool much, if any, over the next 2 weeks other than perhaps in localized areas. There may still be August-like SSTs going into mid-October!

Absolutely warmer SSTs have a lot to do with warm temps over land close to body of waters.

psyclone wrote:It's nice to see some local bay area mets are finally beginning to question the obs coming out of Tampa international airport. I've long viewed them as suspect now bordering on absurd. In such an observation rich environment I wonder why persistent statistical outliers were roundly accepted absent question. Now long overdue questions are being asked and hopefully someone digs up some answers and fixes whatever may be inaccurate. If you believe the obs (I'm now firmly in the "don't believe/something's wrong" camp) today's high of 96 breaks the all time high for October.

I wouldn't question it too much, offshore winds usually have the warmest effects closest to a body of water, add to it the heat island effect and it does not sound too way off. Every time I am in Tampa and I stay by the airport I do feel the difference of how warmer or hotter it is compared to areas just east of town. If it is off is probably by a degree or two, IMO.