Predictions are showing it circling back around after hitting S. Carolina, and because of the tropical storm further out, Matthew could circle back and come across Florida AGAIN and end up in the Gulf.
Posted on 10/06/2016 3:53:10 AM PDT by 11th_VA
Officially, Matthew’s top sustained winds were at 115 mph as of the 11 pm EDT advisory from the National Hurricane Center. This makes Matthew a low-end Category 3 storm. Matthew’s efforts to reorganize and reintensify on Wednesday afternoon and evening were been a mixed bag. Hurricane Hunters found Matthew’s eyewall partially open at times, and the top surface winds had yet to rebound significantly. On the other hand, the convective core of showers and thunderstorms surrounding Matthew’s center has intensified and expanded, and Matthew’s central pressure began dropping late Wednesday night, a sign that the enhanced convection may be helping Matthew to regain intensity. An 11:03 pm Wednesday fix from the Air Force hurricane hunters found that Matthew had finally closed off its eyewall, and the central pressure had dropped to 959 mb. In its 11 pm EDT discussion, NHC noted that Matthew’s eye--once again distinct on satellite imagery--has contracted to about 17 miles wide, another sign of strengthening. It may take until midday Thursday for any substantial drop in Matthew’s pressure to result in a stronger wind field. NHC predicts that Matthew will again hit Category 4 intensity by Thursday evening. The 00Z Thursday SHIPS model forecast gave an 11% chance that Matthew would intensify enough to become a Category 5 storm again by Thursday night.
Track update: Still heading for Florida coast
Matthew continues heading on a northwest track that will take it just west of New Providence Island, putting Nassau in the most intense part of the storm’s dangerous right-hand side. However, Matthew may head just far enough west to avoid the worst-case impacts for Nassau, most likely tracking over parts of Andros Island. Unlike the mountainous parts of eastern Cuba and western Haiti that took a toll on Matthew as it crossed them, Andros is a very flat island, so it should have little or no effect on the storm.
Should Matthew continue on its due-northwest track, it would come uncomfortably close to making landfall along the urban corridor from Miami to Palm Beach. Our most reliable track models insist that Matthew will begin angling just to the right before landfall, which would keep the southern part of this corridor on Matthew’s weaker side. Broward County (including Fort Lauderdale) is in a hurricane warning, while Miami-Dade County is in a tropical storm warning. The risk of dangerous impacts, including hurricane-force winds, ramps up greatly from Palm Beach northward. The most recent NHC forecast (see Figure 2 above) keeps Matthew as a Category 4 hurricane as it reaches the Melbourne area on Friday morning and a strong Category 3 by Friday evening just east of Jacksonville. The 00Z Thursday run of the GFS model agrees very closely with the official NHC track. Hurricane Warnings are now in effect from Broward County to Fernandina Beach, Florida, with a Hurricane Watch extending northward to Edisto Beach, South Carolina.
If NHC’s forecast were to prove spot-on, conditions along Florida’s central and northern Atlantic coast could easily top anything observed in many decades. As we noted this afternoon, the Melbourne area--including Kennedy Space Center--has never recorded a major hurricane. Hurricane Dora struck near St. Augustine, FL, as a Category 3 in 1965, but otherwise the Jacksonville area and its 1.5 million residents have never experienced a hurricane of this magnitude. A northward-moving “coast scraper” hurricane has the potential to cause widespread damage over an enormous swath of populated area. In general, the storm surge threat with such a storm would be less than for a perpendicular landfall, but as the Atlantic coast begins curving toward Georgia, the risk of dangerous storm surge will rise markedly, with inundations of up to 8 feet possible from Sebastian Inlet, FL, to the Georgia/South Carolina border.
The bottom line: Matthew continues to pose a potentially dire threat to much of Florida’s Atlantic coast, with major impacts likely along the Georgia coast and potentially further north.
Latest data is 125 MPH winds.
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/graphics_at4+shtml/094542.shtml?5-daynl#contents
Keep an eye on the millibars to see if they continue to fall. No pun intended!
Local stations now saying it could hit West Palm Beach up to Canaveral, but will at least up the coast, 140 mph winds.
The Gulf Stream is very warm this year and the storm is moving rather slowly. That makes conditions ripe for a big power increas to 4 or more.
My prediction is that it will hit coastal areas from Florida all of the way north to Pennsylvania at least, riding the Gulf Stream.
bkmk
The Gulf Stream is perfect for Matthew to strengthen. It is like a hot-tub super highway, but I think the storm will get caught up with a front that is pushing toward the southeast. Where it goes after Monday is going to be a wild guess.
I live on the southeast Georgia coast on an Island. I will be heading inland today. This is one big powerful storm. God’s blessings to all...
I’m in Ashville for the weekend - hotels sold out in western NC
Last report I heard was that most hotels here in South Carolina were full.
I predict a particularly strong Atlantic hurricane season with several big storms making landfall. My same prediction for the past 12 years! It is finally coming true. See, I am a scientist. We have a consensus.
World-Class Prognosticator!
I was disappointed to find out The Weather Channel owned wunderground.com. I think they bought it out, because I used to rely on wunderground as an alternative to TWC.
THEN I saw one day they were one and the same, operating under different brand names.
I think intellicast.com might still be independent.
My kin from Charleston headed home for Indiana.
3 little ones, (one a newborn) and Mother in law was a bit much for an extended stay in a motel.
Took them 6 hours just to get to Columbia yesterday
My parents lived there. Dad would quip that the "giant sandbar" couldn't be evacuated because of the large population and the small number of bridges. I can't begin to imagine the damage if a big one hits the coastline from Melbourne to Cape Canaveral.
Predictions are showing it circling back around after hitting S. Carolina, and because of the tropical storm further out, Matthew could circle back and come across Florida AGAIN and end up in the Gulf.
Never let a good crisis go to waste.
Destroy those military and Republican absentee ballots.
... glad you're getting out - stay safe.
Category 4 Surge Map:
This is a good time to remember a proposed nuclear reactor that looks like a large shipping container, is factory sealed, and can ride on the back of a rail car or a heavy semi truck.
The idea is that with power out, repair crews go to find high tension lines, and use low voltage to figure out were the nearest breaks in the line are. As they get the lines repaired to commercial and residential areas, the truck rolls in and hooks “jumpers” to the line, to provide power locally.
The repair crews continue down the line, fixing break after break, extending the power coverage area, then telling the truck or rail car, which boosts its current.
This gets the entire system working much faster, both to get back on the grid, and to speed up post disaster repairs.
Importantly, there are already ship carried nuclear reactors performing this function near coasts and on major rivers.
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