12 PM EDT update on the entire tropics

[WXBUFFJIM]

Taking a look at the tropics today reveals relatively quiet conditions for the Atlantic Basin and the eastern Pacific. The big story is out in the western Pacific with Tropical Storm Mindulle continuing to slowly develop. Tropical Storm Mindulle is located near latitude 15.7 north, longitude 137.0 east. Movement is towards the west southwest at over 22 mph. Maximum sustained winds are now near 60 mph with higher gusts. Further strengthening is expected and Mindulle is expected to become a typhoon in the next 36-48 hours. The track of this thing continues to trend further south with each advisory. As a result, it appears the north central Philippines are in the line of fire with Mindulle. This will mean strong winds with gusts well over hurricane force, storm surge flooding of 6-8 feet, and very heavy rains as this area is pretty mountainous. The biggest concern is definitely going to be the very heavy rains given the orographic effects we're talking about here.

Beyond that point, either Taiwan or more likely Vietnam will likely need to keep an eye on this storm system. More updates will be issued on this system as it develops.

Shifting out focus out to the eastern Pacific reveals a few features of note. One of the special features is a 1008 mb tropical disturbance around latitude 13 north, longitude 115 west. This thing has some scattered moderate to strong convection. The low level center remains exposed on the east side of the convection, thus some shear continues to interact with this. However given how organized it is becoming, we cannot rule out a developing depression in this area over the next day or so. There is also another areas further east around 13 north, 100 west that has convection associated with it. This also could become a depression potentially in the next day or two. None of these systems are expected to impact land as they are both moving west away from the Mexican coast.

In the Gulf Of Mexico, showers and thunderstorms continue to develop over the northwest Gulf as a disturbance over Texas continues to feed in tremendous Gulf Of Mexico moisture into southeast Texas and into Louisiana. Beaumont has seen over 4 inches of rain in the past few hours and more is on the way for the Beaumont/Port Authur area. Houston also ain't out of the woods as another 2-4 inches of rain is likely there today as well. This area does not need anymore rain as repetitive rains have caused road closures in some locations due to flooding over the past few days. This system is not expected to develop into a tropical system though. But it's bad enough even without a tropical system as we've seen this year in Haiti and also in northeast Brazil. The rest of the Gulf is quiet today.

Meanwhile in the Caribbean, an upper level low is situated just east of the Yucatan with a few showers and storms just west of the Cayman Islands this afternoon. This batch of activity will not develop with the shear in place. Most of the Caribbean is being dominated by strong surface winds from the east at 25-35 mph with 10-15 foot seas. However with sunshine across about 90% of the Caribbean, the weather is absolutely beautiful. In Aruba, winds gusted to 35 mph last evening from the east. Aruba tends to see an east wind during most of the year making this region one of the more easier places in the world to wind surf. Those type of conditions will likely linger for awhile. Thus if you're into Wind Surfing, Aruba is the place because as far as the eye can see from the Caribbean to the tropical Atlantic, no tropical develop is expected anytime soon.

Jim

[chris_fit]

Good and thorough update, thanks!