Tropical Storm Arlene: June 28, Update A

Here we go! The first named storm of the season – and a dinky little thing she is too. J

I’ve been a tad busy lately but that hasn’t stopped me from keeping half an eye on this Gulf of Mexico blobette as she has developed over the past 24 hours, and now we have Tropical Storm Arlene.

She’s in the southwest Gulf, in the Bay of Campeche, and is heading West-Northwest, with landfall expected in Mexico late on Weds/early Thursday. They sent in a plane this afternoon to investigate and found some low-level circulation. She is centered at 21.2N, 93.7W and is moving WNW at 7mph. Although she has been named, she’s barely a Tropical Storm, with estimated winds of about 40mph (Tropical Storm range: 39-73mph). Minimum central pressure is 1003 mb. There is some decent circulation now in the lowest half of the troposphere – so about 5-6km above the earth’s surface. But convection has been a bit slow, and although there are some isolated heavy thunderstorms, it’s not quite what we would see with a well-developed Tropical Storm.

It’s a bit late in the day, so I’ll leave Arlene to think about things over night and I’ll pop back in tomorrow with an update.

Night night!

J.

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DISCLAIMER:
These remarks are just what I think/see regarding tropical storms - not the opinion of any organization I represent. If you are making an evacuation decision, please heed your local emergency management and the National Hurricane Center's official forecast and the National Weather Service announcements. This is not an official forecast. If I "run away, run away" (Monty Python), I'll let you know.
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