The Latest on the Tropics

Ernesto is actually weaker this evening. Ernesto has lost a little organization. It is probably running into dry air over the Caribbean.

It still will likely become a hurricane in the next 48 hours as it moves over the western Caribbean. By then, the system will be slowing its forward speed in response to the weakness that is going to be over the northern Gulf Coast. It should reach the Yucatan on Wednesday afternoon and will spend Wednesday night and Thursday morning crossing the peninsula. It will emerge over the southwestern Gulf of Mexico Thursday afternoon.

The global models are in decent agreement that the system will move over the Bay of Campeche and make landfall in Mexico, staying well south of Texas and posing no threat to the northern Gulf Coast. We will be watching.

WHAT ABOUT FLO? Florence has defied the models and the forecasters at the NHC so far. There was talk that the storm would quickly weaken after forming. So far that hasn’t happened, and there isn’t any sign of it happening soon despite dry air surrounding it and relatively cool ocean water. It might actually be stronger than Ernesto now.

The storm has been shoved more westward by high pressure to its north, and that is expected to change as the storm encounters a weakness in the ridge and turns northwestward eventually, carrying it north of the islands.

Category: Tropical