We’ve been talking a lot about the subtropics this hurricane season – the zone of the Atlantic basin that includes the Gulf and the waters directly east and north of Florida and the Bahamas – as stealing a little more of the action this year due to El Niño’s stranglehold on the deep tropics. It’s no surprise then that all three named storms so far this hurricane season have originated in this subtropical arena.
The National Hurricane Center added two more lemons over the subtropical Atlantic to their tropical outlook map since Thursday.
One system is a decidedly non-tropical low-pressure system along a cold front way out over the far northeastern Atlantic and closer to Europe than to the Americas. It could take on some subtropical or even tropical characteristics over the record- to near-record warm waters west of Portugal, but the upshot regardless will be high surf, blustery weather, and periods of heavy rain to parts of Portugal and northern Spain Sunday into early Monday local time.
Meanwhile a weak and disorganized area of low pressure hundreds of miles southeast of Bermuda over the middle subtropical Atlantic has been given a 20% chance of developing, mainly early next week as it moves generally northward into the north Atlantic. It’s unlikely we see significant development as the system moves near or east of Newfoundland and Atlantic Canada by next Tuesday into Wednesday.
Models waffle on development in the eastern Atlantic next week
Forecast models continue to waffle from run-to-run on development odds for a tropical wave that’ll be rolling off Africa into the eastern Atlantic early next week.
Although the development signal has persisted for late next week in the eastern Atlantic, it’s less pronounced than in earlier runs. Google’s DeepMind 1,000-member ensemble has been especially jumpy from run-to-run, but other modeling camps like the European model ensembles have been more consistent with its development signal for later next week.
NHC hasn’t yet introduced the disturbance in its outlook, but we’ll probably see another lemon added over the weekend if trends persist.
Either way, this will have plenty of hurdles ahead given the nagging wind shear draped across the central Atlantic and isn’t anything for us stateside to be concerned with for next week.
Future Moke to slide south of Hawaii, but bring big rains to the Big Island
Yesterday morning we discussed the disturbance dubbed Invest 90E well southeast of Hawaii that was later upgraded to Tropical Depression Two-C Thursday.
The system remained disorganized Friday morning but is forecast to organize into Tropical Storm Moke by later on Friday. Over the past 24 hours, models have shifted noticeably southward, a positive trend that ensures the center of future Moke will pass 100-200 miles comfortably to the south of Hawaii.
Models have also trended way down in their intensity forecasts and show future Moke struggling as a low to mid-tier tropical storm through the weekend.
Regardless, the system’s outer circulation will enhance heavy rains on Maui and east-facing slopes of the Big Island, where up to 15 inches of rain will be possible, with the heaviest rains occurring from Sunday through next Tuesday local time. Although totals will be much lower than what Lala brought last weekend, the rains will compound rapid runoff issues with already-swollen rivers and streams.
A Flood Watch is in effect from Saturday through Monday afternoon for the windward and southeast side of the Big Island.
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