Steve wrote:NDG wrote:12z GFS is going to give a bit more confidence to the NHC that Erika will not die out over the next couple of days and that it will gain strength steadily after that as it tracks across the Bahamas.
Now lets see if the 12z Euro stays consistent with last night's run.
Right. The strange thing is that with < 5 days before NHC track landfall, we have a legitimate hurricane threat that might not be anything of substance at least until the Bahamas. It's probably going to pulse up and down for the next 48-60 hours (or longer) as per the GFS anyway. And you have possibilities from an open wave with some squally weather to a deepening Category 1 - and we won't know probably until within 30 hours of potential FL landfall for sure. Some people might just stall out on making decisions, so I would bet that NHC probably continues to keep it classified as at least TD Erika (were it to degenerate) throughout the forecast period just to keep it fresh in people's minds.
Agree with everything you just said except that I'm thinking that the range could be even broader - from a wave to a major hurricane. It will have to contend with poor conditions today, however if we see significant renewed convective bursting as we had last night, than I"m thinking that we'll actually start to see Erika begin to better organize at the point of hitting those warmer SST's just north of P.R. I'm not seeing that cut off low progged to be over E. Cuba, as continuing to be as a destructive cause for vertical shear as the discussion indicated- that is, assuming that today doesn't take too much a toll on its present overall structure.