Sunday, August 17, 2008

Things are becoming more clear...




I think the NHC is finally coming to the realization that a Charley like track is not going to happen...  Again not to slam the NHC with their forecast, but I just don't know why they do some of the things they do...  I have no doubt they are some of the very best in the NWS, but my beef with them is over simple details that anyone with some meteorological experience could have seen...  The center of Fay was not where they had it on their graphics.  Finally today they have it right but even then the NHC has it turning way too north, way too fast...   Just looking at visible satellite imagery you can see that's not going to happen...  Again referring to my previous post, until the storm starts to really ramp up its going to head much more west than the NHC or the models think...  Even though 18z early track was starting to pick up on this...


Fay is like Jim Brown, Bo Jackson, or Emmitt Smith with 9 in the box...  The scary thing is Fay like those great running backs are extremely powerful and resilient!  It first took on dry air and won.  Second it took on Hispaniola and won.  Now it's taking on Cuba and it will win that battle as well...  This is really scary to me because once it get past Cuba I really see Fay intensifying rapidly...  Also the more west it goes the stronger it will get...  Not only will that mean a Gulf Coast landfall, it means that Fay will move close to the Loop current and very high ocean water heat...  The closer it gets to that, the worst this storm is going to be...  



Just look at the ocean heat potential in the Gulf of Mexico...  This is bad news if Fay continues to move west....  You can see the difference between Fay popping out in west Cuba compared to central Cuba...  Anything over 40 is decent, so you can see why I'm so worried about it going over west Cuba...  You start to see numbers over 100 which is NOT GOOD!!!  I'm still sticking to my track and intensity forecast with Fay...  I don't see any reason to make any changes as everything looks to be on track for the most part...  Of course things can and will change but I really believe the general ideas I have will be close...  I expect major hurricane Fay to strike the Florida Panhandle region late Wednesday/early Thursday as a major hurricane!!!



Oh, I almost forgot...  Tonight is the 39th anniversary of Hurricane Camille!  The second strongest hurricane to ever strike the US in recorded history...  Camille made landfall in Pass Cristian, MS just before midnight August 17th 1969...  Sustained winds of 190mph, 909mb (26.84") pressure, and a storm surge of 25 feet...  Can you even imagine how scary that was, especially at night!!!  It was the benchmark for all Gulf Coast hurricanes until Katrina in 2005!!!  Ironically Katrina struck about 20 miles west in Waveland, MS...  


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