Friday Evening...

I am battling Fay fatigue......just frankly a little tired of talking about it.....or maybe I am just tired. Either way, Fay will continue to dump lots of rain in Florida and Georgia and spread into Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana as the weekend unfolds.

Around here, great weather this evening for high school football. The weekend looks pretty nice as well with highs in the 80s and continued lower humidity values.

It still looks like some of Fay's moisture will make it up our way Tuesday through Thursday next week. In fact, we might see some sort of wedge event take place....meaning that period could be rainy with highs only in the 70s. We shall see.

The potential for tropical development in the southwestern Atlantic and Caribbean Sea looks high next week, and I have the feeling a significant tropical system will be on the map as we head into Labor Day weekend. Will it threaten the Gulf or the Eastern Seaboard.....can't say yet.

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Thursday Evening...

Not much on the old brain this evening. It still looks like the remnants of Fay could finally make it in here around mid-week next week.

Also, we have this little gem off of the 12z European....Labor Day weekend anyone?

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Euro Nuggets...

Sounds like some combo at McDonald's...but alas, I am talking about a couple of things off of the 12z European model.

First, the Euro continues to eventually bring Fay into a position to bring us a good swath of rain by mid-week next week. That would be good news. Secondly, the Euro also brings our next potential system to northern Cuba toward the end of next work week. See both images below.

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Wednesday Afternoon...

Fay is crawling northward near the Space Coast of Florida this afternoon. It does not look like Fay will make it too far into the Atlantic, so I don't think we will see significant strengthening before Fay makes the left-hand turn back into north Florida.

Fay will then slowly cross Florida, heading westward, and either move into the Florida panhandle or the northern Gulf. If Fay does get over the northern Gulf, then it could strengthen again, but I really believe Fay's legacy will be rainfall. Portions of Florida continue to get blasted with rain, and north Florida will really see some impressive rain totals over the next 48 hours. After that, I expect the rain to pile up in portions of south Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

For us, most of Fay's rain will stay to our south through the weekend. However, there continue to be signs that what it left of Fay could get picked up by an approaching trough and lifted toward our area around Tuesday and Wednesday. We will see.

Otherwise, we continue to watch 94L out in the Atlantic...no immediate signs of development yet.

I also need to mention that it will be rather breezy around here tomorrow. The pressure gradient between Fay and an area of high pressure to our north will cause easterly winds to gust between 20 and 30mph at times.....

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Quick Tuesday night hit...

Fay will emerge off of the Florida coast tonight, and I expect this will have some steady strengthening in the 24 hours that follow. The system will then head back west toward the coast and make yet another landfall....this time in northern Florida or possibly as far north as Georgia. I don't expect a direct hit for the Carolina coast, but certainly some rough surf and the threat of spin-off tornadoes in the outer rain bands.

For the Piedmont, again, a lot of the rain will miss us, but Fay's remnants will be meandering around for many days...maybe at some point we can get some of the rain up our way.

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Tuesday Midday...

Fay made landfall in southwest Florida overnight last night, and the system is actually looking quite healthy on radar imagery. Fay will slowly cross southern Florida today and tonight and likely emerge off of the Florida Atlantic coast tomorrow morning. South Florida is quite flat with lots of swamps, so weakening will be slow to occur.

Once out in the Atlantic, Fay will be over the Gulf stream, and the upper air pattern will be favorable for strengthening, assuming the system stays off of the coast. The scenario I have outlined in previous posts is seeming more likely, and I think another landfall will occur on the upper Georgia or possible South Carolina coast. How strong Fay will be at that landfall is impossible to tell, but like I said, the pattern looks favorable for strengthening.

Once back inland again, Fay will travel slowly off to the west or northwest. As it stands now, most of the soaking rains look to stay to the south of North Carolina. Unfortunate. However, I am not ready to say we will not see any rain just yet....there is some chance the remnants might try to bend up toward West Virginia, and if that is the case, we could see some nice rain. So that is still up in the air a bit.

Our next tropical wave, Invest 94L, is out in the Atlantic. Some modeling really strengthens this system quickly, but I am more of the thought that this wave will be similar to Fay....development will be slow to occur, and might not happen until it gets closer to the Bahamas. We need to keep a close eye on this one because to me, this looks like it will either hit the U.S. East coast or re-curve out to sea. Stay tuned....we have about a week to keep watching that one.

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Monday Evening...

Fay is close to the SW coast of Florida. Sure looks like this has a chance of going inland near Naples, or possible a little north of there.

From there, the big question is becoming can this get back over the Atlantic? This is an idea I have been kicking around in these blog posts for several days, and it seems to be gaining traction.

Like I mentioned in a previous post, if Fay gets back out over the Atlantic, the waters are very warm, and some significant strengthening is possible. And all indications to me are that if Fay does get back over the Atlantic, the upper air pattern will dictate it getting push again back westward into Georgia or the Carolinas.

So again, I will stress that if you are heading to the Carolina coast, you need to pay very close attention to Fay. Without a doubt it is going to be a very wet week along the coast, but I am concerned about the possibility of this having some teeth to it as well.

For the Piedmont, I am discouraged in terms of our soaking rain potential. I think it is likely we will see at least SOME rain from the system, but not nearly as much as we would have seen had the system moved up to our west. I notice the HPC 5-day precipitation forecast has a large area of 25" of rain just off the Southeast coast....can't recall ever seeing 25" on that map before. This will be a slow-mover, and it is going to put down a lot of rain...it just looks like a lot of that might be in the ocean.

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Monday Morning...

Fay took a more northerly jog overnight and has already crossed Cuba. I am getting that sinking feeling that we might miss out on a lot of the rain from this system. First of all, we will have to be on the right side of the system to get any good rain. This jog to the east of the forecast track doesn't make me feel good. Secondly, a lot of modeling is now stalling Fay's remnants out off to our south. That would not be great either.

I and I will also add that the possibility (that had been discussed here earlier) of a second landfall on the Atlantic coast is gaining some life this morning. If this crosses Florida and gets back out over the water off of Daytona or Jacksonville, then obviously a threat would be alive for the Carolinas coast. S0, those with beach plans....pay attention to Fay!

And, don't look now, but out next tropical wave out in the Atlantic is trying to get its act together, and we will probably be talking about another tropical system in the southwest Atlantic by this weekend. See the model plots down a bit in the right-hand column....it is Invest 94L.

Take this with a grain of salt...these are my pre-coffee ramblings after a lengthy work week.....

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Brrrr

The high temperature Saturday in Denver was only 58 degrees! Keep in mind, this is mid-August. That is the lowest high temperature ever recorded for the date in Denver.

The reason?? A cold core upper level low sitting right over Colorado.

Now back to our regular weather programming.....check out the radar loop of Fay on the right.

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Wow....feeling it.......

I am really dragging today. This has been a very busy week for me, and I am feeling it today. I was here tracking storms on the air with you until after 2am this morning. In fact, yesterday started with the "meet the coach" meeting at 9am for my daughter's upcoming soccer season. After all of the work last night, I hit the bed at 3am, back up in the 9am hour to head to Sunday School, then basically straight from Sunday School to work again today. I am ready for an off day.

At any rate, most of the modeling has taken a westward shift with Fay's eventual track....see the model plot on the right. The NHC has followed suit with their 5pm forecast package. My ideas on this system are pretty close to the NHC's. There is still some chance Fay could try to eventually swing to our east as opposed to west, but those chances get lower with each hour Fay keep tracking WNW. I do need to mention that if Fay continues to get its inner core organized, there could be some significant strengthening over the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

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