Sunday, August 24, 2008

Fay Lingers Tonight...Slow Drift to NE

What's left of Fay has drifted closer to us just north of Bogalusa near the Louisiana/Mississippi border. She's showing little movement tonight. Her heaviest rain band has rotated around her south side and is passing along the coast to the south of us. The concern is IF she doesn't move, we still could see some more intense flooding type rainfall Monday & Tuesday. Today's totals have been between 1-3" stretched out over many hours so little flooding occurred. We could see another 1-2" tomorrow, but that should cause no major problems. IF Fay should hang around into Tues-Wed, then we could start to have some flooding troubles.

Down the road we look into the Caribbean to watch another strong wave that could develop into our next storm. Again it's so far away I will not start the hype/hysteria already see on many blogs. When we need to worry, I'll let you know.

8 comments:

HundredOaks said...

A question, please. Is it likely or reasonable that the remnants of this system would leave a presence or vacuum (lack of presence) which would be something that would draw another storm right behind? Or would there be ridging building in as soon as this system finally exits which would serve to block another storm from moving northward toward the central gulf coast?

Caveman said...

"Today's totals have been between 1-3" stretched out over many hours so little flooding occurred. We could see another 1-2" tomorrow.."

Sounds like that is pretty much what the weather serivce called for give or take 12hrs..

Caveman said...

The forecast for 94L
The models have had a tough time properly handling 94L, and have not been making believable forecasts of the storm's track and speed. The latest (8 am EDT Sunday) GFDL forecast appears to have the most believable forecast I've seen, developing 94L into a tropical storm that tracks over extreme Southwest Haiti, then into the region between Jamaica and Cuba. The NOGAPS and ECMWF models have also been developing 94L with each run the past few days. Heavy rain and high winds from 94L's circulation should affect Haiti's southern Peninsula on Tuesday morning, and spread to Jamaica and eastern Cuba by Tuesday night. The wind shear forecast for the Caribbean calls for very low values of wind shear around 5 knots for most of the coming week. Residents of Haiti, Jamaica, and Cuba should keep a careful eye on this potentially dangerous disturbance. I expect 94L will be a tropical depression by Tuesday, and will eventually grow into a tropical storm or hurricane that will threaten Cuba, the U.S., and/or the Bahama Islands late this week.

Bob Breck said...

caveman, you sound like you read Weather Underground a lot. In fact you sound very much like Dr. Masters. As for saying..."pretty much what the weather service called for..." Who are you kiddin? They had a Flash Flood Watch up calling for 4-6" OR MORE...and all the other channels followed that forecast EXCEPT FOX 8. In fact, that Flood Watch was still up this morning. I'm glad you were more specific forecasting Gustav. Thanks. We'll see how good you are.

Bob Breck said...

hundredoaks...tropical weather is influenced by surface features (blocking highs, frontal boundaries/troughs etc) IF the system is weak (depression or Trop. Storm). Once the system builds into a stronger Hurricane, the upper winds enter the picture. It's way too soon to say what will be over us next week IF Gustav gets into the Gulf. My hope is he stays east of Florida or way south of Cuba into the Yucatan. Way too soon to forecast where he goes. My guess is to the Yucatan, but I would prefer east of FLA.

Caveman said...

Isn't a flash flood watch meaning that flooding MAY occur withing a certain time period, diff from a flash flood warning...

Yep just cut and pasted it... never said it was me.

Bourbon St. Blues said...

Geez all we need is another Russian named storm. Hopefully he will not be Katrina's brother.

Based on the current forecast track it seems like it is possible to get into the Gulf, so I would count nothing out yet. Hopefully it will have traveled directly over Cuba and weaken over the mountains there.

Thoughts to ponder.

30-35 years ago my parents never evacuated from hurricanes. I was too young to remember Betsy and only 5 yrs old when Camille hit I only remember the next morning when going outside in the back yard and saw tree damage.

With Katrina, I remember we were not leaving as of Saturday night. I woke up Sunday morning @ 6:30 and listened to Bob and the storm blossomed overnight to a Cat 5 with 175 mile winds and woke my wife and told her we had to get out of here. Packed up and left. Its quite different when you have children and faced with these decisions.

Anyway...let watch Gustav and hope for the best.

BSB

Caveman said...

NOT looking good, major shift to west by models can make this guy easily become Katrina's brother! May not hit us but someone may get hit HARD on this one...