Lee drenching the Gulf Coast; Katia a Cat 2
Tropical Storm Lee made landfall on the southern coast of Louisiana near 4 am CDT this morning, and continues to inch slowly northward and dump very heavy rains. The storm is not a threat to intensify, since its center lies over land, but enough of the storm's circulation is over water that Lee will be slow to weaken. At New Orleans Lakefront Airport, 8.85" inches of rain had fallen from Lee as of 9 am CDT this morning. Top winds this morning hit 46 mph, gusting to 57 mph, at 6:28 am CDT, when a heavy squall blew in. Latest satellite loops show Lee has lost quite a bit of its heavy thunderstorms since yesterday, but the storm remains a formidable rain-maker. Lee brought a storm surge of 4 feet to New Canal Station in Lake Pontchartrain and at Shell Beach east of New Orleans yesterday afternoon. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center reported eight probable tornadoes from Lee yesterday. These tornadoes damaged approximately ten buildings, but caused no deaths or injuries.
Figure 1. Observed rainfall for the seven-day period ending at 8 am EDT Sunday Sep 4, 2011. Tropical Storm Lee had dumped 5 -10 inches of rain over a large swath of the coast, with a few areas in excess of ten inches (pink colors). Image credit: NOAA/AHPS.
Figure 2. Predicted rainfall for the 5-day period 8am EDT Sunday - 8 am EDT Friday, Sep 9, 2011. Lee is expected to bring a large swath of 4+ inches of rain all the way to the mid-Atlantic. Image credit: NOAA/HPC.
Forecast for Lee
Lee's large size and slow movement will make heavy rains the main concern today. Later in the week, the remnants of Lee's may be a problem for the mid-Atlantic and Northeast, where recovery efforts from the devastating flooding due to Hurricane Irene may be hampered by an additional 2 - 3 inches of rain. Tornadoes from Lee are a potential hazard today, as NOAA's Storm Prediction Center is highlighting the Northern Gulf Coast in their "slight risk" area for severe weather. A tornado watch is posted for the region, but no tornadoes have been reported as of 9 am CDT.
Hurricane Katia
Hurricane Katia finally overcame the wind shear and dry air interfering with it, and intensified into a Category 2 hurricane with 100 mph winds this morning. Latest satellite loops show a well-defined eye for the first time, but the hurricane still has a lopsided appearance, due to he impacts of dry air and moderate wind shear of 10 - 20 knots on its southwest side.
Katia will not pose a danger to any land areas over the next five days, but may be a threat to the U.S. late this week. The computer models disagree considerably on the position and strength of a trough of low pressure that will develop over the Eastern U.S. late this week, and thus how Katia will be steered. The evolution of this trough will be strongly affected by Tropical Storm Lee, and the models are not very skillful at predicting transitions from tropical storm to extratropical storm, which will happen to Lee by Wednesday this week. We have two of our reliable models--the ECMWF and UKMET--predicting that the trough will form farther west, steering Katia very close to North Carolina late this week. The rest of the models predict a more easterly position of the trough, which would force Katia to turn northwards towards Canada well before reaching North Carolina. Either scenario is possible, and it will probably be at least another day before the models converge on a solution for the long-term fate of Katia. It's likely that locations on the U.S. coast south of North Carolina will not receive a direct hit from Katia, but the entire coast from North Carolina northwards to New England and Canada's Maritime Provinces is definitely at risk. Long period swells from Katia will begin affecting the Bahamas tonight, then reach the Southeast U.S. by Monday morning. By Tuesday morning, the entire U.S. East Coast will see high surf from Katia, and these waves will increase in size and power as the storm grows closer. Given the slow movement of Katia as it approaches the coast, plus its expected Category 1 to 3 strength as it approaches, the storm will probably cause extensive beach erosion and dangerous rip tides for many days.
Figure 3. Morning satellite image of Hurricane Katia.
Elsewhere in the tropics
This week and next week typically mark the two most active weeks of the Atlantic hurricane season, and there are two potential threat areas we need to watch. The GFS model predicts that a tropical depression could form in the southern Gulf of Mexico's Bay of Campeche by Friday or Saturday this week. Several other models give support to this idea, and predict such a storm would track northwards or north-northeastwards towards the northern Gulf Coast between Louisiana and the Florida Panhandle. The other region to watch is between the Lesser Antilles and the coast of Africa. The NOGAPS model is predicting that a tropical wave currently near the coast of Africa could develop into a tropical depression late this week, and arrive in the northern Lesser Antilles by Saturday or Sunday.
Jeff Masters
This is what happens when you do not tie up your boat....
This was taken in Pass Christian MS
Reader Comments
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Personally, I think NOGAPS is crap on this animation....comments?
I was wondering the same thing. The water temps of the Bayou have to be pretty warm.
Know exactly what year?
You better chase it, we really need its input!
XD
Agreed. Way too far south. I would be more inclined to give it a second look if we had a much stronger subtropical ridge that had its western flank parked over the SECONUS.
We don't.
So yeah. A bit out to lunch.
Weatherunderground.com
Long range yeah, but closer it gets in the better they are. My statement was getting close enough now that the tracking should be reliable. Yeah, it miss points here and there but it will likely end up where NHC says. Hats off to you if you better than models. You should let them know as I sure your salary would be a hell ouva lot cheaper than models, people to input info in models and recon data for models.
Is it any good? Never visited that site before...
How reliable is that model compared to the others, usually? Wasn't that the one that was closest to Irene's outcome? Asking because I'm in eastern NC. TIA
well hi neighbor! i'm off of Juban rd. haven't been out since yesterday when i had to run to carters. lots of standing water.
Dr. Masters said its the best model in depicting troughs..so right now you should watch this one in relation to Katia
Interesting prediction scheme. Simple, easy to follow.
(j/k)
Adjusted T#: T5.3
Raw T#: T5.7
I'm off an iPad so pardon the slow responses lol.
Of note, the Adj. T-number went up T0.5 in 30 minutes and the Raw T-number went up T0.1 in the same time.
UW - CIMSS
ADVANCED DVORAK TECHNIQUE
ADT-Version 8.1.3
Tropical Cyclone Intensity Algorithm
----- Current Analysis -----
Date : 04 SEP 2011 Time : 171500 UTC
Lat : 22:11:36 N Lon : 59:28:40 W
CI# /Pressure/ Vmax
4.8 / 974.5mb/ 84.8kt
Final T# Adj T# Raw T#
4.8 5.3 5.7
Estimated radius of max. wind based on IR : 17 km
Center Temp : -3.5C Cloud Region Temp : -64.3C
Scene Type : EYE
Positioning Method : RING/SPIRAL COMBINATION
Ocean Basin : ATLANTIC
Dvorak CI > MSLP Conversion Used : ATLANTIC
Tno/CI Rules : Constraint Limits : MW AdjEnd
Weakening Flag : OFF
Rapid Dissipation Flag : OFF
The Atlantic Systems will become less frequent over the next few weeks.
lol, and we've only had one (Katia).
The biggest thing to watch for here with the ECMWF is to see if it gets a nasty case of the "windshield wipers." If the 00z is hammering the Carolinas, while the 12z is just offshore of Bermuda, then it too is having issues handling the trough and Lee.
If it remains consistent run to run, well....crap
I am off of Range. I went to Albertson's but had thought about Carters. I had seen pix that Pete's Hwy was flooded so decided against it, lol. I had also read that Range and 12 was closed but not sure for how long.
Wow, an increase in Carribean activity towards the end of the month. Has Levi seen this?
(j/k again)
"-NUMBERS FROM TAFB AND SAB ARE 4.5 ON THE DVORAK SCALE AND ON THIS
BASIS...THE INITIAL INTENSITY IS INCREASED TO 75 KNOTS. THERE ARE
NO CLEAR REASONS...AND I AM NOT GOING TO MAKE ONE UP...TO EXPLAIN
THE RECENT STRENGTHENING OF EPSILON AND I AM JUST DESCRIBING THE
FACTS. HOWEVER...I STILL HAVE TO MAKE AN INTENSITY FORECAST AND THE
BEST BET AT THIS TIME IS TO PREDICT WEAKENING DUE TO COLD WATER
...HIGH SHEAR AND DRY AIR."
"HOWEVER...THE UPPER LEVEL WINDS ARE EXPECTED TO BE
HIGHLY UNFAVORABLE AND EPSILON WILL LIKELY BECOME A REMNANT LOW. I
HEARD THAT BEFORE ABOUT EPSILON...HAVEN'T YOU?"
"EPSILON HAS IGNORED THE
COLD SSTS AS WELL AS THE STRONG UPPER-LEVEL WESTERLIES AND HAS
MAINTAINED HURRICANE STRENGTH. I AM AM NOT GOING TO SPECULATE ANY
MORE ON THE FUTURE INTENSITY OF EPSILON AND WILL JUST FOLLOW SHIPS
AND GFDL WHICH ARE THE BEST GUIDANCE AVAILABLE."
"I HAVE RUN OUT OF THINGS TO SAY...AND THIS ONE WILL BE SHORT.
EPSILON CONTINUES ON STEADY STATE WITH A RING OF DEEP CONVECTION
WHICH INTERMITTENTLY SURROUNDS THE LARGE EYE."
"THE END IS IN SIGHT...YES...BUT NOT QUITE YET. I THOUGHT I WAS GOING
TO FIND A WEAKENING SYSTEM AND INSTEAD I FOUND THAT EPSILON IS
STILL A HURRICANE."
"I HOPE THIS
IS THE END OF THE LONG LASTING 2005 HURRICANE SEASON."
DOWNLOADING SARCASM...
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89% complete
its still at NC unfortunately..
I just seems like it either stays the same or shifts a little further west each run.
LOL, it does sound like Epsilon gave Avila a hard time.
XD
is F5 The location on center?
aaaand it stopped moving northeast, its moving more north again, and local forecasters are out their mind, they keep imaging "bands of heavy convection from Lee training over west coast of Florida producing 1 to 3 inches with locally higher amounts".
Hey guys, those bands don't exist, lol.
That is avery interesting animation, Lee splits and the southern part looks like a TD making landfall in the Florida Panhandle, followed by Katia landfalling on the east coast of Florida. Bad news for Florida if that pans out. Though if I had to pick between that scenario and Katia landfalling in NC, I would think Florida would be the least bad of the two. better yet if Katia tracks between NC and Bermuda.
I believe there are viewers of this forum without Levi's or some of the regulars background knowledge on tropical storms.
Now I'm even more glad it missed me.
Also, a disturbance is taking shape in the Eastern Atl.
Viewing: 401 - 451
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