Gamma Grumbling Towards Gulf?

Just before The Lady is to sing tomorrow night, NHC has increased their probability for tropical development over the Western Caribbean to 70% for this weekend.

The top graphic has the TWO areas NHC thinks something will develop with the tropical wave approaching the Islands given only a 20% chance.  The area south of Jamaica has a much higher probability as there has been a concentrated burst of storms this evening.  The bottom graphic is the predicted Monday midday location from the GFS model of what appears to be a tropical depression or weak named storm (Gamma) in the Gulf just north of the Yucatan.

The good news for us is we have several cold fronts coming that will block movement towards the northern Gulf.  IF Gamma forms, it will either turn to the NE towards south/central Florida next week, or it will be steered WSW into the Bay of Campeche AWAY from us.   The NE Caribbean is a historically favorite location for October storms so this is no surprise.

As you can see, the first cold front has stalled over south Florida with our next one coming through on Friday.  Late Sunday we could see yet another front, now up in Canada, plow down to us.   The water temps over the southern Gulf are still plenty warm (85-88), but the northern Gulf has cooled to 80-85 with Lake Pontchartrain now in the high 70s.   We still need to pay attention for about another 10 days, but I have NOT cancelled The Lady's singing gig for tomorrow night.   Cold fronts are our friends!

Finally I mentioned earlier that California is not the only state with huge wildfires.  Most of the white over land in the top photo is smoke. The middle pic has fires in southern Wyoming, Colorado, Utah & New Mexico.  The bottom view was taken just before sunset showing how extensive the area the smoke plumes cover.  My son in Longmont (NE of Boulder) said the sky was clear, but you couldn't see the sun due to all the smoke.  Let's hope their rainy/snow season gets off to an earlier start.  Stay tuned!