I’m actually surprised that Danny has maintained tropical storm status as of this posting. Most of the overnight and the early part of today Danny has been in pieces. The main circulation at the surface, and the individual area of rain associated with Danny. The problem is, those two pieces are about 100 miles apart! When I saw the early visible satellite imagery today you can clearly see the swirl of low clouds that is pinpointed by the coordinates. But the more impressive storms and the bulk of the cloud cover is displaced to the northwest. All of this is thanks to an upper level low pressure area that is spinning over the southeastern part of the United States. Recon data also showed that the tropical storm force winds are within the storms, but not near the center of circulation. But, as of the last advisory which came down at 10am, Danny still remains a tropical storm. If he’s lucky he’ll hold on as a minimal storm as it passes by the North Carolina coast, but after that it won’t have much of a chance to strengthen. It will be rapidly pulled northward, then northeastward, into the colder waters of the North Atlantic. Some fringe effects will probably be felt along the East Coast, but I’m not anticipating Danny to make hurricane status. If Danny stays this disorganized, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the official status dropped back to Tropical Depression.
Another wave about half way across the Atlantic looks about the same as yesterday, and there still is a marginal chance that it will develop over the next couple of days. Most computer models do develop something out there and initial tracks head it basically in the same direction as Danny and its big brother Bill.
Over the weekend we will be running a rain chance of about 30-40%. So far this morning we’ve seen most of the action over Texas. A new line of storms has developed from Lake Charles to the offshore waters. It’s crawling along to the east. A few isolated pop up storms have dotted Evangeline, Allen, Jefferson Davis, and Acadia Parishes too. I would expect a few more storms to pop up as we get into the afternoon, and hopefully the convection will taper off once the sun goes down. There’s a lot of football going on tonight…rain makes for an interesting and messy game, but it’s not so much fun for the fans. And if there’s lightning, then nobody plays. Keeping the fingers crossed that most of the storms die out by football time, or at the very least, the lightning.
Saturday and Sunday we’ve got a front that will stall over central Louisiana. This will keep things warm and humid, with chances for midday and afternoon storms. Another cold front that is currently passing through the great plains will push southward by Sunday afternoon and clear everything out. Drier air will move back in and the forecast looks very comfortable for Monday and Tuesday. So the borderline “football weather” will be coming in a couple of days late. Sorry folks. Have a great weekend!
StormTeam3 Meteorologist Dave Baker
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