Lead Hurricane Expert Alex DaSilva discusses the intensifying tropical activity and the hybrid system that looks to affect the East Coast this weekend.
00:00Let's bring them on in. Our lead hurricane expert, Alex Da Silva. Plenty to discuss. Let's get right to it. Jerry formed at 11 o'clock yesterday morning. It's a tropical storm, and boy, it's still rocketing to the north-northwest here this morning.
00:17Yeah, it certainly is, and the hurricane hunters are flying around in the storm as we speak right now, and they're finding that a lot of the convection is located south and east of the center of circulation right now. The storm is being sheared a little bit from the north and to the west right now, so it is still maintaining its intensity, the hurricane hunters are finding, but it's certainly not going to be in any hurry, I think, to intensify here over the next 24 hours as it's still battling some of that wind shear.
00:43So I expect some slow intensification maybe throughout the day, possibly becoming a hurricane during the day tomorrow as it's approaching the northern Leeward Islands there.
00:53Yeah, no pathway for this to the United States. That's been our message from the get-go.
00:57Okay, a little complicated setup, and we get this during the early part and the tail end of the hurricane season.
01:05We continue to have a high risk for development along the southeast and mid-Atlantic coast this weekend.
01:13Yeah, I think we're going to have some sort of hybrid system coming up the coast this weekend here. It's going to start to form on Friday and then certainly start to move up the coast this weekend here, right along the coast there.
01:26Slow mover we're going to be dealing with here, but, you know, it's possible that it could get a name. We'll just have to see. I think it's going to have some components that are tropical and some components that are non-tropical, but at the end of the day, it's not going to matter.
01:39I think the impacts are generally going to be the same whether it gets a name or not.
01:43Well, let's go over the non-tropical characteristics of this system.
01:46Well, pretty simple in that it's not coming from the tropics.
01:51The energy is actually coming across the United States, and there it is by Friday, Alex.
01:59You have the upper low across Georgia, and then all of that energy in the red I have highlighted off the Georgia-South Carolina coast.
02:08Yeah, this storm is going to be getting some of its energy from the upper levels of the atmosphere.
02:13Essentially, that is what's making it a hybrid storm.
02:15If it was purely tropical, it would just be getting its energy from the ocean.
02:19But since it's going to be interacting with the jet stream to the west, that's why we believe this will be some sort of hybrid storm as it interacts with that jet stream.
02:27That's what will cause that intensification as well as being over the warm waters.
02:30It will slowly move up the coast, and it could be a prolonged event here, multiple high tide cycles, strong northeasterly winds.
02:39We could be dealing with some big-time coastal issues here, flooding, erosion, a lot of big-time problems here this weekend.
02:45We showed you the non-tropical characteristics.
02:50Here's where it can gain some tropical characteristics, Alex.
02:54And you can clearly see the Gulf Stream there all the way up off the North Carolina coast.
03:00And that's why if it sits over the warm water, even though it's more like a cold core or a storm that you'd see in the winter, this is where you could see a little transition.
03:09Yeah, you could.
03:10And again, we always look for about 80 degrees Fahrenheit or so.
03:13And so you see those waters, they're right about around that 80 degree Fahrenheit temperature.
03:18So I do believe this will be a hybrid storm.
03:20It's going to have components of tropical and non-tropical.
03:23We'll see if it ends up getting a name.
03:24Like I said, it doesn't matter at the end of the day.
03:26But, you know, the difference between them, you know, really comes down to where the storm is getting its energy from.
03:33A tropical system, it's getting its energy from the ocean.
03:37And a subtropical storm or a non-tropical storm is getting its energy more from the upper levels of the atmosphere, the jet stream.
03:44So this will be getting a little bit of both as it's coming up the coast.
03:48Really quickly, we'll end with this.
03:50We're tracking another tropical wave as we head in the next week.
03:54Yeah, indeed we are.
03:56And we're starting to get towards the end of the season when it comes towards, in terms of these tropical waves.
04:01Usually after about mid-October, you know, the waves are a little bit more weak coming off the coast of Africa.
04:07And we usually look closer to home for more of that homegrown development.
04:10But I still think we can have one or two more chances for the rest of the season with these tropical waves.
04:15Low chance on this one, October 12th through the 14th.
04:18Plenty of time to watch this next one.
04:21AccuWeather lead hurricane expert Alex De Silva, thanks for joining us here on AccuWeather.
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