ATL: IRMA - Models

[PTPatrick]

Not a forecast but I'm pretty well accustom to these models shifting west and west and more west in these scenarios and then taking stronger last minute right hooks when they finally feel the weakness north...see Ivan, Dennis, Charley, Matthew, Katrina...you get my point. Not saying it will or won't happen. Really we aren't dealing with huge swings here anymore. The consensus is clear for final landfall near fort Meyers and due north over Orlando right now. It'll be so big the last minute right hook, if it took one over the keys, would likely only be a material difference for upper Dade and broward . But a couple miles east or west up at Ocala won't matter. Tampa/st Pete is certainly succeptible to any further west shifts, but they would benefit from any sharper north turn faster. Anyway, cake is nearly baked I think with respect to track thru Florida.

[tolakram]

How could these gusts possibly be correct? Over 100mph gusts in Palm Beach County with a landfall in Collier County?

Is this your first big landfalling hurricane? I assume because it's a BIG storm and will probably be high cat 3 or low cat 4 at landfall. With rain to mix the winds down these gusts seem about right.

Strongest storm I've been through was Wilma but her eyewall went right over us, Frances and Jeanne missed us to the north.

Wilma was 110kts at landfall, or more like 90kts if you lived in the same place then as now.

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2005/di ... .037.shtml?

[SunnyThoughts]

How is the Navgem model for accuracy in the tropics? Is that the Navy model that everyone use to talk about years ago?

[tailgater]

Looks like some of the Euro ensemble member take Irma in from near Marathon Key to well west of Key West maybe even Dry Tortugas then northward to west of Cedar Key to as far east as Ga, SC border.

https://weather.us/model-charts/euro/79 ... 0600z.html

[Steve]

This Euro is going to freak the NHC forecasters out. If it rides up southwest coast to Tampa, the surge will be incredible and people have not evacuated and are not expecting this at all.

Tampa is under a hurricane and storm surge watch. Tampa has issued mandatory evacuations. Please don't spread false info.

While wearing are under a mandatory zone A evacuation order I can tell you majority of people I've spoken to have not evacuated and are not planning on.

Here's the problem. If people want to play macho or believe hearsay from Facebook, it's on them. I feel bad for those who get stuck. But government officials have offered to get anyone out who needs help. And people believe absolute b.s. these days. I was talking with some co-workers today about someone's outrageous post the other day about Irma becoming a Category 6. Everyone ought to know there is no such thing. But one of them told me her son came home from school talking about Cat 6's yesterday. She and her husband told him there is no such thing, but he said his science teacher told him that. Seriously. Where the blank does a science teacher get the idea of a Category 6 from? Oh yeah, social media. Bah!

Btw, very interesting move by many of the models today. I think EC may be too far west initially, but maybe not because it comes back in SW FL fairly far south. Sketchy 48 hours ahead. We usually don't have this kind of disparity among the major global models within 48 hours.

[tolakram]

More of an observation and a question than anything else but ... wasn't a small upper level low supposed to drop in from the Texas area that would help steer the storm east.

Water vapor loop shows nothing, at least from my amateur analysis. Katia got a lot stronger than originally modeled so I wonder if that changed something.

https://weather.msfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/get-goes?satellite=GOES-E%20CONUS&lat=25&lon=-80&info=wv&zoom=4&width=1600&height=800&quality=90&type=Animation&palette=wv1.pal&numframes=30&mapcolor=black

[Blown Away]

:uarrow: And to think that just 24 hrs ago people on the west coast of FL were thinking that they had dodge a bullet. Long live the King!

People on the east coaat better not feel much better until it passes by...a few wobbles and we get it head on

It's pretty clear that ridge was underestimated... No signs that anything but slight W shifts from here...

[jlauderdal]

How could these gusts possibly be correct? Over 100mph gusts in Palm Beach County with a landfall in Collier County?

Is this your first big landfalling hurricane? I assume because it's a BIG storm and will probably be high cat 3 or low cat 4 at landfall. With rain to mix the winds down these gusts seem about right.

Strongest storm I've been through was Wilma but her eyewall went right over us, Frances and Jeanne missed us to the north.

we had a pretty good punch from katrina as it went just to our south...eye went right over nhc actually..wilma definitely caused more damage and power outage was a massive issue

[Steve]

Not a forecast but I'm pretty well accustom to these models shifting west and west and more west in these scenarios and then taking stronger last minute right hooks when they finally feel the weakness north...see Ivan, Dennis, Charley, Matthew, Katrina...you get my point. Not saying it will or won't happen. Really we aren't dealing with huge swings here anymore. The consensus is clear for final landfall near fort Meyers and due north over Orlando right now. It'll be so big the last minute right hook, if it took one over the keys, would likely only be a material difference for upper Dade and broward . But a couple miles east or west up at Ocala won't matter. Tampa/st Pete is certainly succeptible to any further west shifts, but they would benefit from any sharper north turn faster. Anyway, cake is nearly baked I think with respect to track thru Florida.

Funny, because it's the opposite here. Everything tends to hook east if it's directed at us - not everything, but most storms. So everyone always has that complacent idea that storm x will hit MS, AL or FL as "they always do." Ivan was a prime example of that. Of course we're the north side of the basin and you are an east facing side of the western basin. Mileage varies by location.

[Etika]

We usually don't have this kind of disparity among the major global models within 48 hours.

Is there really such a disparity? I would say that the models are pretty much in line - or at least no different than usual at this point. Instead it seems to me that the geography of Florida peninsula and the angle of approach of Irma make small course changes to have far greater effect on expected impacts than usual. So, to me it seems that models are doing just as well they usually do, there is just interest in better-than-usual accuracy due to the geography.

[Steve]

More of an observation and a question than anything else but ... wasn't a small upper level low supposed to drop in from the Texas area that would help steer the storm east.

Water vapor loop shows nothing, at least from my amateur analysis. Katia got a lot stronger than originally modeled so I wonder if that changed something.

https://weather.msfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/get-goes?satellite=GOES-E%20CONUS&lat=25&lon=-80&info=wv&zoom=4&width=1600&height=800&quality=90&type=Animation&palette=wv1.pal&numframes=30&mapcolor=black

There are two of them. Again, props to Aric for pointing them out last weekend. The first is in eastern Kansas near the Missouri border. The second is near the Montana border with North and South Dakota. Both are spinning inside of a massive upper ridge behind the Gulf Coast trough that goes way up into northern Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

Give it another look.

[Maineman]

ECMWF 12z Ensemble tracks are in

Irma

https://weather.us/cyclone-tracks/euro/ ... -irma.html

Jose

https://kachelmannwetter.com/de/wirbels ... -jose.html

Click to zoom in, choose time steps in menu.

[PTPatrick]

Not a forecast but I'm pretty well accustom to these models shifting west and west and more west in these scenarios and then taking stronger last minute right hooks when they finally feel the weakness north...see Ivan, Dennis, Charley, Matthew, Katrina...you get my point. Not saying it will or won't happen. Really we aren't dealing with huge swings here anymore. The consensus is clear for final landfall near fort Meyers and due north over Orlando right now. It'll be so big the last minute right hook, if it took one over the keys, would likely only be a material difference for upper Dade and broward . But a couple miles east or west up at Ocala won't matter. Tampa/st Pete is certainly succeptible to any further west shifts, but they would benefit from any sharper north turn faster. Anyway, cake is nearly baked I think with respect to track thru Florida.

Funny, because it's the opposite here. Everything tends to hook east if it's directed at us - not everything, but most storms. So everyone always has that complacent idea that storm x will hit MS, AL or FL as "they always do." Ivan was a prime example of that. Of course we're the north side of the basin and you are an east facing side of the western basin. Mileage varies by location.

Ha I am from Mississippi but live out west now. I don't have a dog in the fight but lots of Miami friends so I've been watching. I have friends all over the state though. The last minute north/east turns I spoke of was mainly from the last 15 years old north gulf coast with lots of those storms but also watching storms on fl east coast

[Steve]

We usually don't have this kind of disparity among the major global models within 48 hours.

Is there really such a disparity? I would say that the models are pretty much in line - or at least no different than usual at this point. Instead it seems to me that the geography of Florida peninsula and the angle of approach of Irma make small course changes to have far greater effect on expected impacts than usual. So, to me it seems that models are doing just as well they usually do, there is just interest in better-than-usual accuracy due to the geography.

Yes and yes. Generally within 48 hours, one or two outliers are present. They don't usually keep shifting inside of that timeframe's run when it's this close (or run to run this close). Katrina was within 72 hours and a 200 mile shift. But it was a very uncommon change. I watch everything coming into the US because it interests me. I guess there isn't that much "disparity" as the lines are pretty close except early (south of Florida and coming up in this case). But the constant changes this late are odd as are the differences in the first 48 hours. It's one thing to move a line a dozen or two miles from Bay St. Louis to Long Beach or from Miami to Ft. Lauderdale. But its' another thing to swing and keep swinging rather than swinging and correcting. You don't see it that often (we did a bit in Matthew last year).

As to your point about the geography of Florida and certainly the currents there, yeah. It's in a class all by itself. Everyone looks at a flat map and thinks that Florida is sort of North south and maybe bends up a little NNW. But if you look at it on a globe or from space, North America isn't really as positioned North/South as we are used to seeing on maps. It's actually kind of angled on a curve. So while we tend to look at things in 2D when discussing landfall and track and stuff, it's really not exactly like that as you know.
https://www.videoblocks.com/video/sunri ... zio1yqgc7/

[Agua]

Ha I am from Mississippi but live out west now. I don't have a dog in the fight but lots of Miami friends so I've been watching. I have friends all over the state though. The last minute north/east turns I spoke of was mainly from the last 15 years old north gulf coast with lots of those storms but also watching storms on fl east coast

Yup, the old eastern fade as I refer to it. I'm struggling to think of a single northerly traveling storm that didn't fade east of forecast in the last 24 hours. [ETA - referring to the North Central Gulf Coast]

[southwest southerner]

Ha I am from Mississippi but live out west now. I don't have a dog in the fight but lots of Miami friends so I've been watching. I have friends all over the state though. The last minute north/east turns I spoke of was mainly from the last 15 years old north gulf coast with lots of those storms but also watching storms on fl east coast

Yup, the old eastern fade as I refer to it. I'm struggling to think of a single northerly traveling storm that didn't fade east of forecast in the last 24 hours.

Ike

[Steve]

Ha I am from Mississippi but live out west now. I don't have a dog in the fight but lots of Miami friends so I've been watching. I have friends all over the state though. The last minute north/east turns I spoke of was mainly from the last 15 years old north gulf coast with lots of those storms but also watching storms on fl east coast

Yup, the old eastern fade as I refer to it. I'm struggling to think of a single northerly traveling storm that didn't fade east of forecast in the last 24 hours. [ETA - referring to the North Central Gulf Coast]

Gustav 2008. It actually landfell and went west. But I think that type of scenario is more likely earlier in the season than later. Other recent notable north Gulf hurricanes did - Ivan, Katrina and Rita. Ike sort of hooked a bit WNW before coming in and didn't hit the parabolic curve until it was inland.

[adam0983]

More east is our friend keeping most of the bad weather off the. State.

[BIGWIND]

Ike, I've seen that easterly fade (right hook) quite a few times as well.
Like a gear turning counterclockwise then brushing up against a flat surface <O>>>>>>>>>>

[gatorcane]

ECMWF 12z Ensemble tracks are in

Irma

https://weather.us/cyclone-tracks/euro/ ... -irma.html

Jose

https://kachelmannwetter.com/de/wirbels ... -jose.html

Click to zoom in, choose time steps in menu.

Nearly all the ensembles for Irma have her moving due west into the northern coast of Cuba with many into Cuba. But clearly that is not the case looking at Irma right now.