Only Thing Worse Than a Monday...

A Tuesday following opening weekend of NFL football. I had this past Monday off after a full day of football and geez, maybe should have considered Tuesday as well :) I have declared the first full Sunday of football an "unofficial" national holiday, right in there with Labor Day!





We're now fully into mid September and a check of long range computer models into the 10+ day timeframe are showcasing the strongest cold fronts we have seen in months. It's only a matter of time before the first front of the season passes across west central Florida with much lower humidity and daily highs in the 70s to mid 80s! The attached image is off the GFS model in the 10 day forecast period. In the image, continental polar air is making a run toward the northern tier of the United States. An air mass of that magnitude could bring the first taste of frost to many areas in the northern part of the country.

The days of open windows and sliding glass doors to let a fresh cross-breeze through the house will be a welcome sight. Despite the fact this September is -0.8 degrees cooler than normal, May thru August have all been above average by a range of +0.7 to +1.5 degrees.

Naturally, hotter than normal also translates into higher than normal cooling bills!

The most impressive "non" official tropical system

Watching the past few days an area of disturbed weather in the central Atlantic has really been astonishing. I can't recall the last time I felt a disturbed area of weather was on the verge of seeing an upgrade to a depression or even skipping to a tropical storm.



Essentially, each day we've seen the development of nocturnal thunderstorms into a large mesoscale convective complex. With warm ocean water and a fairly good environment to take this MCC to the next level as a functioning depression or tropical storm, we'd typically see surface pressures fall with the development of a low level circulation. Instead, for the second straight day I've been on-air discussing how close we are to an upgrade only to watch the low level circulation not enclose... incredible.


















I'll attach a chart showcasing satellite estimated wind speeds and direction within this large expansive complex of storms. Indeed, we can see evidence of a trough of low pressure with the wave but not the closed circulation we'd expect to see. I drew flow pattern arrows on to the image to better illustrate the morning circulation roughly 10 meters above the surface.



















Hurricane hunters will perform an air recon mission today to investigate this complex / disturbed area of weather further. We shall see if I'll be going on-air for a third straight day to talk about the "soon to be tropical depression or storm"... impressive.