At 8:00AM today, Wednesday, July 11, 2013, Tropical Storm Chantal was located 155 miles south-southwest of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, which is approximately 882 miles southeast of Miami, FL.
Winds have decreased overnight, and are now estimated to be near 45 mph. Further weakening of Chantal is forecast to continue as it crosses over the Dominican Republic.
Chantal is racing toward the west at 29 mph. This motion is expected to continue today before it turns toward the northwest tomorrow. However, if Chantal weakens into a tropical wave, it is forecast to only continue moving westward through the Caribbean Sea.
Models are in general disagreement regarding the path of Tropical Storm Chantal, and there is high uncertainty within the models since Chantal may just be a tropical wave. Current solutions range from crossing Cuba into the Gulf of Mexico to paralleling the Florida Coast.
The official forecast from the National Hurricane Center sends Chantal across the Dominican Republic and Cuba where it weakens into a Tropical Depression before it parallels the Florida Coast starting on Friday night before making landfall near Savannah, Georgia, early Sunday morning.
There is a 49% chance that Chantal could become a tropical depression over the next 24-48 hours.
A hurricane hunter reconnaissance aircraft is enroute to determine if Chantal is indeed a tropical storm.
Florida Outlook:
The entire Florida Peninsula and portions of the Florida Big Bend are currently in the 5 day error cone and chances of seeing Tropical Storm force winds occurring over the state within the next 5 days remain about 5-20%.
Regardless of how close Chantal gets to the Florida coast heavy rains and high rip current risks remain our main threat Saturday through Monday.
No comments:
Post a Comment