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Still no major weather issues here through Labor Day; partly sunny days, fair nights, and just a few widely scattered showers. Highs in the low 90s; very typical weather for the unofficial ending weekend of summer. All of the attention here will be on the tropical weather situation….
GUSTAV NOW: Still a strong tropical storm this morning, moving away from Jamaica. Gustav seems to be in a position to grow into a major hurricane, moving into the southern Gulf of Mexico over the weekend. A number of models ramp Gustav up into the category four/five range over the warm water of the Central Gulf of Mexico.
I still think we need to maintain the highest probability of landfall in the area from Morgan City east to Gulf Shores. However, everyone from Corpus Christi, Texas to Panama City, Florida are not out of the woods. I think we can safely eliminate the area from Panama City down to Tampa from the danger zone.
DOING THE HOKEY POKEY: While the 00Z models shifted to the left, the 06Z models have shifted to the right.
*The HWRF now brings Gustav right up into the mouth of the Mississippi River, and New Orleans, as an extremely dangerous hurricane Monday afternoon. The HWRF has clearly shifted to the right, and is much faster.
*The GFDL brings Gustav to Dauphin Island Monday night as a major hurricane. Worst case for Gulf Shores and the rest of the Alabama coast.
*The GFS brings Gustav to near Dauphin Island Tuesday morning.
Most other tropical models move Gustav to Southeast Louisiana, but there are a few outliers to the east and to the west. The official NHC track is on the west side of the model envelope, taking Gustav to Morgan City, and then west/northwest to near Cameron.
NOBODY knows where Gustav will come ashore now… everyone has their opinion, and the guessing game is in full progress, but we will have better clarity in coming days. There is a NOAA G-IV mission scheduled later today; the data gathered will be entered into model initialization and hopefully there will be better agreement.
BOTTOM LINE: There is a very real chance a powerful hurricane will make landfall on the Gulf Coast Monday night or Tuesday of next week. Evacuations will begin this weekend; it is possible that the City of New Orleans will be evacuated, along with parts, if not all, of the Mississippi and Alabama coast. And, contra-flow will be initiated along with these evacuation orders, possibly impacting I-55, I-59, and I-65. Stay tuned to the blog for additional thoughts and updates… and be sure and watch the Weather Xtreme video for all of the graphics associated with this discussion.
NORTH AND CENTRAL ALABAMA: If Gustav does move ashore in the Morgan City to Gulf Shores zone, it could mean very windy and wet weather here by Tuesday or Wednesday, but the GFS stalls Gustav over far Southwest Alabama, and then it moves southwest due to a block that develops to the north. This could keep rain totals here from getting out of hand, but the impact on this part of Alabama remains unclear at this point.
HANNA: This thing sure looks like it is on the way to becoming a hurricane. Steering currents collapse, and it lingers, or drifts southwest, east of the Bahamas during the middle part of next week. And yep, the ECMWF wants to bring this down through the Florida Straights and into the Gulf of Mexico. I would say this is pretty unlikely, but possible. Everyone from Key West to Jacksonville and Charleston will need to keep a close eye on this one.
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