TRACKING THE TROPICS - Monday, Sept. 9

e e ch I'll e and good morning everyone meteorologist Steve karate here uh time to start ramping up the messaging with h what is now tropical storm Francine as of 10 o'clock this morning that is a brand new update from the National Hurricane Center the hurricane Hunters have been out there this morning and did find enough to give it the upgrade so we're going to get into that and uh we are facing what appears to be a significant hurricane threat for Louisiana so we need to have that in mind and we may not be much more than 48 hours away from landfall so the window to get prepared is going to rapidly start shrinking so please do keep that in mind all right let's walk through things so here's the advisory as of 10:00 a.m. maximum winds 50 miles hour uh right now moving North Northwest at 5 now the hurricane Center still points out that the core isn't terribly well organized just yet but well enough organized to get the upgrade to make this tropical storm Francine so let's give you a look at the forecast track which does show it uh moving northward and then turning more northeastward there's H certainly been more of an Eastward Trend uh on the potential landfall location uh from say what we were showing you 24 hours ago so this point where I've paused now this is 7 a.m. Wednesday morning showing a category one hurricane just offshore of Louisiana by the way we'll come back to this but if you can make it out in Orange along our Coast as if were to Grand aisle the shades of blue that is a tropical storm watch and remember what that means hurricane watch means hurricane conditions possible within the next 48 hours tropical storm watch tropical storm conditions possible within that window all right so landfall is shown by Wednesday evening so right now looks most likely landfall would be Wednesday afternoon Wednesday evening right now the forecast does show it as a category one uh I do want to point out there is some guidance that indicates the potential of this coming in a bit stronger so I've started to ramp up the messaging this morning that we should all be preparing for the potential of a category 2 hurricane that's not out of the question this gets really tricky with the intensity closer to landfall we think over about uh the next 36 hours conditions are generally going to be pretty favorable for development and in the 10: a.m. discussion the Hurricane Center even mentions that some of the products they look at for potential rapid intensification showing maybe an uptick in odds that that could happen which is not something we want to see but in the last 6 to 12 hours maybe as this approaches the coast there are indications that wind she could start to increase pretty quickly we're going to have an upper level trough moving into the West that would tend to increase wind shear these things are really difficult to forecast though uh and how quickly the storm feels that and reacts to that so right now no real weakening is shown at landfall although it's possible but there's a lot of uncertainty on that so we need to have in our heads not only is this forecast as a category one at landfall that category two is certainly within the realm of possibility now as I've been trying to emphasize if there's any bit of good news here you knowe that 7 PM Wednesday watch that by 12 hours later potentially well up into Mississippi so it is expected to be moving at a good clip so at least the windows of the window of those most significant impacts it's not going to be Terri prolong you know I hate to get too much compared in storms but for people have been around here long everybody remembers for instance gustof which was such a slow moving storm and we just had hours on hours uh upon hours of tropical storm force winds and at least a window we had some hurricane Force gusts this one looks to be moving much more quickly than for instance a storm like gusta so that by Thursday morning we're already starting to see conditions improve and then from there it continues farther Inland all right so here's an updated look and this is just coming in so I wasn't sure if this was going to update or not but it looks like it has so these are the tropical storm and hurricane watches that are now in effect as of 10: a. so everybody in Orange is under a hurricane watch so that does include uh you know Iberville Parish Westward here through parts of kadana Lafayette Vermillion Parish and down along the Coast assumption here locally you're included West and East patent River Ascension Livingston St James St John the Baptist Metro New Orleans all under a tropical storm watch as it stands right now now given the forecast track we'll see how this plays out it's not out of the question that some of these Inland parishes at some point could get could get an upgrade to a hurricane watch or warning um we'll certainly keep you updated on that but that's where we stand right now with the first round of watches that are in effect we also do have a storm surge watch now in effect that runs all the way from High Island Texas over to the uh Mississippi Alabama border so remember that's where there's the potential of life-threatening storm surge give me a minute uh I've been scrambling here to to get all this information with the advisory just coming out at 10: a.m. let's see if I can get a look at the storm surge num all right here's what the the first outlook for storm surge is from the ntional Hurricane Center they're saying from Cameron to Port fuson uh up to five to 10 feet of storm surge that's significant right uh Vermilion Bay also in that five to 10 foot range Port fushan Eastward to the mouth of the Mississippi River four to S feet of Surge and then High Island Texas Texas off our West High Island Texas over to Cameron 3 to5 um I don't see numbers in here listed sometimes they'll kind of break out uh Lakes Pon train and moros and I don't see those broken out so we'll have to come back to that point and see where those numbers may end up there's a first look at the storm surge potential here's the satellite and no doubt about it we're seeing quite the blossoming of convection storms right in the Southwest Gulf this morning so it uh appears to be a system that's organizing and when you see a blow up like that it makes you a little bit concerned that we could see some significant strengthening doesn't always happen when you see a blow up like that but it's it's something to watch for here's a look at the visible satellite this morning we will zoom in a little bit closer and hard to see um a real good look at what's going on near the surface with so many storms blossoming near the uh budding Setter at this point but again the hurricane Hunters have been out there and found enough to give it the upgrade here's a a look at the computer models now as of um what is today Monday morning and as we advance this so here we are Tuesday evening you can see at that point uh so you know a little less than 36 hours from now already starting to see that bend to the right and that's been one of the changes here in the Outlook uh if you were with us over the weekend um that bend initially was forecast to happen a little later in time so a lot of the guidance now showing that bend to the right a little bit sooner and what we see here is most of the guidance plotted here shows the storm coming putt us on the worst side of the storm much of our viewing area so that's not a good track right there is some guidance that indicates it could end up farther east um and as we saw this is not a storm coming in at Ida intensity but as we saw with Ida a few years ago the small shifts do make a pretty big difference when it comes to impacts uh you know Livingston Parish Eastward really got hit hard by Ida EBR we had significant impacts but not as bad as we thought it would be because we had that little Eastward shift so those are the sorts of things now we're going to be tracking the next couple of days those little fine details as we get closer to landfall all right here's what the GFS was showing uh so pretty clearly there a healthy hurricane making landfall that's Wednesday afternoon where you see the shades of purple those are hurricane Force gust and so again you get this general idea if the eye comes in west of Baton Rouge we're more subject to some of the strongest winds potentially impacting Metro baton R and a good chunk of our viewing area uh the European is a touch farther west um but same general idea with the center coming in a little bit West of baton r that would tend to maybe even hit a cavana a little bit harder but um certainly not a great track for our area and then I'm G to kind of walk you through here quickly the graph model so we're going to pick it up Tuesday evening this is 7:30 and as we advance the animation here are midnight headed into Wednesday so what I want you to note is early Wednesday we're probably still not doing bad here locally although we are beginning to see hints of some tropical storm Force gust you see the shades of green those are tropical storm Force gusts beginning to approach the coast maybe as soon as overnight Tuesday into early Wednesday and then as we advance this uh the graph model the latest run of the graph did come in a bit quicker so one of the one of the main differences we're seeing the model guidance right now are some timing differences so that that's something to be resolved too but with that by uh Wednesday morning Daybreak it already has tropical storm force winds on the coast and starting to move Inland in spots and has hurricane force winds here in purple near the coast uh so we'll pause this again it's got landfall by lunchtime on Wednesday which again is a bit quicker than much of our gu Ides but and this is also I do need to point out so among the more aggressive model runs but it shows tropical storm force winds overs spreading most of our area and most of south Louisiana under that scenario might be a little aggressive but something to watch and then here's your area of hurricane Force gust so it's got the center there near Vermilion Bay in South Lafayette around lunchtime on Wednesday shows it moving Inland again on a track just west of Baton rou and you see the potential that exists there if something like that plays out then you're looking at that possibility of hurricane Force gust into the metro area and of course if we do get into hurricane Force gust we're talking about increased potential for not only power outages but the significant power outages so that's a concern right so that that's one of the things we have to watch that's 3 o'clock Wednesday and as we advance this now we're on to 7 o'clock Wednesday evening still seeing tropical storm force winds across a good chunk of the area and then you'll note by midnight it's already starting to show um most of the the worst weather starting to lift out so that's a key Point too that I made before those impacts are going to be quick hitting don't quite think the 10: a.m advisory is updated yet on this graphic but as of the previous advisory it was showing a 5050 chance of sustained tropical storm force wind into Baton Rouge about a 70% chance Lafayette closer to 60% Morgan City so you get the idea increasing probabilities that we get sustained tropical storm Forest winds into the area and then as we look at the rain numbers these have come up a bit since yesterday largely because the track trended a little bit closer to us so now what you see in the weather prediction center Outlook is area average totals anywhere from four to up to 10 in those are average totals um would almost certainly be locally higher in spots where you get some of the heavier rain bands developing so there is going to be a flood threat here at the track and that's something we'll keep an eye on as well the weather prediction center highlighting that already posting a three out of four moderate risk of flooding coming up on Wednesday and that is area wide now when it comes to that flood threat this is a point I've also been emphasizing because I've gotten questioned multiple times not seeing anything of a 2016 magnitude largely because we see the storm moving along at a good clip which helps that doesn't mean we couldn't still see flooding just not anything like that magnitude okay but um we need to pay attention to that threat all right so those are some of the key points it is a 1023 I was initially going to do this around 10:30 I wanted to get a few more Graphics together but uh the East Baton Rouge mayor's office for the Homeland Security emergency preparedness is scheduled a 10:30 news conference which we're going to be streaming live so wanted to wrap this up before before that starts uh real quickly we got a minute or two I will take a try to take a peek here on Facebook see if there's any questions I can answer for you guys uh before we wrap this up key message though you need to be wrapping up Hurricane preparations really today tomorrow we'll start to see some rain moving in theoretically and technically you still have some time tomorrow but it would be best to get your hurricane preparations done today um and then Wednesday is when we expect the most significant all right uh let's just see bear with me guys as I uh I'm just peeking to see if there are any any questions I see a comment or two about the the sound being muffled so apologies if that's the case not sure why this is um we've done another a number of these updates recently where everything seemed to work okay uh one other thing I'll point out is is we don't have a flood watch technically posted yet from the weather service but that that'll that's only a matter of time uh Kristen asked any possibility of cat 2 yes uh kind of mentioned that at the beginning um right now the official forecast is cat one but I think it's um maybe a better and safer thing for us to prepare for that potential of a cat 2 tornado risk uh yes um that's primarily Wednesday Wednesday night Storm Prediction Center right now has posted a one out of five margal risk of spere weather on Wednesday to cover that threat all right um gang I think we'll go ahead and wrap it up as I said coming up at 10:30 uh the mayor's office of Homeland Security emergency preparedness here in Baton rou holding the press conference uh so be sure to watch that uh for the parents I would expect some school closers to start getting announced at minimum I would think Wednesday Thursday are in play there's nothing official to stay with us for those announ announcements but keep in mind that you very real chance of that coming otherwise Jeff Morrow is going to be on air at noon and 4 today I'll be on at 5 6 and 10 tonight we will have continuous updates on on social media uh on digital and on air of course as this threat unfolds but get ready for it looks like a hurricane threat headed to Louisiana with primary impacts Wednesday into Wednesday night