Tropical
Storm Ernesto formed in the tropical Atlantic east of the Windward Islands
Wednesday afternoon. Hurricane hunter
aircraft found tropical storm force winds even though satellite pictures did
not indicate as much organization.
Ernesto was nearing the island of Barbados just after midnight on
Thursday morning. The storm had maximum
sustained winds of 50 mph and was moving west at 22 mph. The latest National Hurricane Center advisory can be found here.
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| Tropical Storm Ernesto approaching Barbados. Click on the image for a larger view. Image Credit: NOAA/NHC. |
Ernesto
will pass through the Windward Islands this morning and head into the Caribbean
Sea. Conditions do not favor significant
strengthening over the next few days and the computer models are tightly
clustered around a westward path.
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| Computer model forecasts of the center of the storm. Image Credit: NCAR. |
However,
the storm may slowly intensify as it moves through the Caribbean Sea. Most storms do not reach hurricane strength
in the eastern Caribbean if they are not already hurricanes. Thus, that is not likely until the storm
moves into the central or western Caribbean Sea. Intensity models suggest that the storm may
become a hurricane as early as day 3, but more likely day 4 or 5.
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| Computer model and official forecasts of intensity. Image Credit: NCAR. |
The
Bermuda high is centered northeast of Bermuda and is directly north of
Ernesto. The strength of the high is
producing a brisk easterly steering current and is why the storm is moving
rapidly to the east.
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| Steering currents over the U.S. and much of the Atlantic Basin. Image Credit: CIMSS. |
What
is the storm likely to do?
Ernesto
should move quickly through the eastern half of the Caribbean Sea with some
strengthening possible. A weakness in
the ridge of high pressure to the north of the storm should occur as it moves
into the western Caribbean. This will
allow the system to slow down in its forward speed. Conditions will also be right for the storm to
strengthen further.
Intensity
is extremely difficult to forecast beyond three days. Current forecasts have the storm as a
category 1 hurricane. However,
conditions may be right for Ernesto to become a major hurricane (category 3, 4,
or 5) by day 5.
At
this point the storm would become problematic.
Some of the dynamical models have the system moving into Mexico. It would certainly threaten parts of the Gulf
of Mexico. However, it is difficult to know how far north the storm might
go. A ridge of high pressure aloft is
forecast to build into the Gulf coast states toward the end of next week. This would definitely argue for the system to
continue westward into Mexico or southern Texas. It could become problematic for the oil rigs
resulting in evacuations soon.
It
is not likely to have any effect on South Carolina. However, tropical moisture over Cuba and the
Bahamas should move into the state by the end of the weekend into early next
week. This will bring scattered
afternoon thunderstorms to the Midlands each day from Sunday through Wednesday.
One
final word of note: Computer models are forecasting a possible storm forming
near the Bahamas and moving northeast.
This is about 10 days out and much can change in that time. This will be watched as we will be moving
into the height of hurricane season about that time.
