Tropical Storms Jerry and Karen, TD 13, and a quick recap of Humberto and Imelda: September 22, Update A

A huge groveling apology for the radio-silence... I was stuck in a time corridor as my TARDIS malfunctioned (you know how that goes) and missed two storms that I see caused some havoc. I'm sure my intelligent friends and readers in Bermuda and Texas are ok (because they read this of course) and had stocked up on ice cream and wine (and canoes!) to get through it all! Anyway, TARDIS is mostly fixed and I'm back, so first, a quick recap on what I missed and then we'll see who else has been invited to Mother Nature's party.

Hurricane Humberto started life as a little storm just north of the Bahamas well over a week ago, but stayed clear (fortunately for that part of the world) and instead made a sharp turn to visit Bermuda. They had a very dark and storm night about 5 days ago, as he zoomed past as a cat 3 storm with winds of 120mph. Fortunately his eye (and strongest winds) remained north of Bermuda, so although most of the island was without power, all made it through. 

Tropical Storm Imelda was a very quick storm that popped up in the Gulf of Mexico around the time Humberto was approaching Bermuda. She barely made tropical storm strength with winds of 40mph (TS range: 39-73 mph), but she had a LOT of rain which she dumped over Texas after making landfall near Freeport late last week. Unfortunately, it looks like at least 5 people died and the flooding was extreme.

I think that brings us up to today...

Tropical Storm Jerry

This little guy formed about 5 days ago in the mid-Atlantic, headed towards the northern end of the Caribbean, became a cat 1 hurricane three days ago, but fortunately decided to avoid the islands (clever chap). He is now heading in the general Bermuda direction and is back to being a strong Tropical Storm with winds of 65mph, central pressure of 993mb. It looks like he'll pass to the north of Bermuda as a Tropical Storm on Tuesday. He is moving NNW at 10mph, and is currently at 27.4N, 67.2W.

He is under some wind shear and has some dry air ahead of him, which we can see in the satellite imagery (the yellow area):

This means that he should slowly decrease in intensity over the next few days. By the way, that little red speck to the north of the strongest convection (shown by the green in this image) is not a smudge on your screen... that is the fearless place we call Bermuda. In this case, if it wasn't for the wind shear, he'd be a hurricane as well because there is some circulation in all levels of the troposphere. So hurray for wind shear! 

Tropical Storm Karen

She formed today (phew, finally caught up!). She is currently at 13.1N, 63.5W, heading WNW at 12mph. 

She's barely a Tropical Storm with winds of 40mph, central pressure of 1007mb, and she's not very big in size yet either (especially if you compare her to Jerry who is to the north), but she has some fairly strong convection in her center, which we can see in the infrared satellite imagery here: 

The NHC don't think she will intensify much over the next two days, as she approaches the islands in the northern Caribbean (Puerto Rico/Virgin Islands) because of wind shear. I don't see the wind shear in the data I'm looking at though. Also, the water she is passing over as she crosses the Caribbean is warm with the upper 100-125m being warmer than 26 deg C. These two factors suggest a gradual increase in intensity, however the big thing working against that is that there is some dry air between her and the northern Caribbean: 

This will really inhibit her growth for the next couple of days. At the most, she'll be a strong Tropical Storm as she gets close to any land, but it's more likely that she'll be a weak TS. 

Tropical Depression Thirteen

I'd like to think 13 is a lucky number. It's too soon to say where he'll head at the moment as he just left Africa, but the next name is Lorenzo. I'll stop here for today as I still have some minor repairs on the TARDIS to finish off...

Toodle pip!

J. 

Twitter: jyovianstorm

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DISCLAIMER:
These remarks are just what I think/see regarding tropical storms. If you are making an evacuation decision, please heed your local emergency management and the National Hurricane Center's official forecast. This is not an official forecast.
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