Tropical Storm Issac Moving Toward Florida/Gulf Coast

Hurricane season is all of a sudden upon us after a relatively quiet summer in the tropics. Now, Tropical Storm Issac is steady with further development to hurricane strength (if not already).

The satellite image (as of Thursday) doesn't show a defined eye. That should change later this week.

The hurricane track from the National Hurricane Center always included a white cone which shows the degree of uncertainty in the movement of the movement. The larger the cone, the greater the uncertainty. Here is a great graph on this "Cone of Uncertainty".

You can trace the beginnings of this storm back to the African country of Guinea when it was a weak tropical wave.

 

Now to the specifics. Most of the statistical and dynamical models bring Issac near Florida later this weekend.

The National Hurricane Center concurs.

Tropical wind speed swath paints a rough picture for Southern Florida.

Rainfall for southern Florida could be excessive!

How does Issac compare to other tropical systems that share similar speed, intensity, motion, location?

 Could Issac redevelop in the Gulf of Mexico and make landfall along the Gulf Coast?  Yes!!!

Computer projections take the remains of Issac right up the east coast next week. This could bring heavy rainfall from Georgia to Virginia. More later this week!