Major hurricane threat for the U.S. Gulf Coast

AccuWeather

AccuWeather's Bernie Rayno and Alex DaSilva continue to monitor the tropical rainstorm in the Caribbean that is expected to strengthen into a major hurricane and hit the U.S. Gulf Coast this week.

Transcript

00:00We want to bring you the latest on this storm and joining us right now is AccuWeather lead hurricane expert

00:05meteorologist Alex De Silva

00:07Alex I looked at the I'm going to call up the satellite picture here

00:10And I want you to see if you notice what I'm noticing here

00:13If you think I'm correct you can clearly see now on the infrared satellite picture some of those clouds the yellows and especially the reds

00:21Trying to wrap around now on the northern and let's see if it gets on the western side of our center of circulation

00:30Yes, certainly starting to see the blow-up of thunderstorms trying to wrap around the center of circulation

00:34That's really the one thing that's missing for this to become a tropical storm

00:38I think the winds are actually closing in on tropical storm strength now

00:41And it wouldn't surprise me if the next National Hurricane Center

00:44Update coming up here in the next hour and a half or so that they name this storm

00:49Things are looking a little bit better in terms of the organization of this tropical rainstorm right now

00:54The exclusive AccuWeather eyepath showing that tropical storm certainly by 8 o'clock

01:00tonight and then a move into the Gulf of Mexico as we go through tomorrow and

01:05History tells us Alex that when these systems get into the eastern Gulf of Mexico. They not only

01:13Intensify but oftentimes they rapidly intensify

01:17Yeah

01:18That area of the of the Atlantic Basin that extreme northwestern Caribbean southeastern Gulf of Mexico

01:24We've seen a lot of storms here in the past few years

01:26You know even five years ten years that have really rapidly intensified in that zone right there

01:32And I'm concerned that this is going to be no different

01:34You can really see this the big blow-up of green on your screen there

01:38That is the moisture really starting to fan out you can see it essentially pushing that yellow area away

01:44That's the dry air to the north. It's starting to create its own environment

01:48And then what you also see is notice that blue moving from the Keys towards, South Florida

01:54That's called the outflow and that's a sign of

01:58weakening wind shear

01:59Yeah, indeed you can really see that again that little area of low pressure to the northwest is backing away the wind shear

02:06I think is going to start to really decrease over the storm here in the next 24 hours or so

02:11And so you're already starting to see the storm start to what we call breathe

02:14You can see the the fanning of those high-level clouds around the top of the storm moving in a clockwise formation

02:21That's indication indications to me that the storm is starting to breathe

02:25It's in entering a more healthy environment

02:27And I would expect to see the storm start to strengthen here in the near in the near future

02:32And then when you talk about water temperature, I mean, it's just high octane. It's like gasoline on the fire

02:37I mean water temperatures in the middle 80s. That's not the only thing you're looking at though Alex. Yeah the water temperatures

02:43This is where they are the warmest in the entire Atlantic Basin that Western Caribbean

02:47It's not only that it's the depth of that warm water. We call that ocean heat content

02:51We've really been pounding that point home

02:53This is what we're really can lead to rapid intensification and what the research has shown can really lead to rapid intensification

03:00Because tropical systems they naturally mix up the water

03:03But if you're mixing up warm water back up to the surface that can allow the essentially that tropical heat engine to continue to run

03:10And so a lot of times where we see storms rapidly intensify

03:14It's correlated to where the highest areas of ocean heat content are located

03:18You can see there the Western Caribbean and into the eastern Gulf of Mexico

03:21That's where we can see really high ocean heat content and that's why we're concerned about the rapid intensification

03:27And it was yesterday before all other known sources that we forecasted a major hurricane

03:33In that area that her happened before Accuweather early started yesterday at 6 a.m

03:39And then you made the announcement at 1030 that everything that we were looking at tells us that not only is this going to be?

03:46A major hurricane, but it's going to be a major hurricane at landfall. Yeah, indeed, and it's not only about that

03:51It's the size of the story. I think this is going to be a pretty large system

03:55So don't pay attention and necessarily where the center of the storm tracks if you live outside that area

04:00This is going to have widespread impacts even beyond the scope of the cone

04:04And so we're concerned about flooding potential and the the storm surge is what I'm really concerned about

04:09Not only are we going to have a strengthening storm, but we're also going to have a growing storm

04:14It's going to be large. And so these larger storms can produce a lot more storm surge

04:18I'm concerned about Tampa Bay and then all the way up into the Big Bend area

04:22We could see a very very significant and potentially deadly storm surge all the way up in those areas now later on today Alex

04:28we're gonna zone in on that iPod so you can see the farthest west toward the

04:33Florida and Alabama state line for this east just south of Florida, but we're gonna wait

04:41Until we see the exact center of circulation

04:44But the thought is Alex that we're gonna we're gonna tighten that up later today

04:48Yeah

04:49I think the chance of a direct impact on Tampa is

04:52Pretty small at this time not to say the impacts aren't going to be pretty significant again

04:56I'm very concerned about the flooding and the storm surge potential into Tampa Bay

05:00So we're probably we're probably gonna trim the the outer edge of that cone to around Tampa

05:05Maybe even a little north and the western side of the cone we can probably trim that, you know

05:10Pretty significantly on the western side as well again kind of narrowing in as we get closer to landfall

05:16We're kind of narrowing in on where we're most concerned about again since the very beginning

05:20We've always been concerned about the Big Bend of Florida and it looks like that

05:24That's where the storm is going to be going. All right Accuweather lead hurricane expert Alex DeSilva Alex

05:29Thanks for the great information here on Accuweather Early

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