Another very busy day - flying here, there and everywhere (not literally of course!). (Actually, it's a very busy two weeks, but sleeping is reserved for the 16th, 17th and 18th of October, so there better not be any storms around then!).
Hurricane Delta is sticking to the plan. He made landfall around 5-6am this morning (local time) south of Cancun as a borderline cat 2 storm and had winds of 110mph by 5.45am local time.
He's now in the Gulf of Mexico at 22.5N, 90.9W, heading WNW at 17mph. Next landfall will be at the 'usual' 2020 drinking spot (the north-central Gulf!) on Friday - keep an eye on the entire cone, not just the center.
He did calm down a notch from yesterday's craziness, and quite right too! He's now a cat 1 storm with winds of 90mph, central pressure 972mb (cat 1 range: 74-95mph).
His circulation (vorticity) is really well developed through the entire troposphere, so he's definitely a hurricane. But there isn't a good eye in the system yet, so I agree with the current estimate of a cat 1 storm. Here are the visible and infrared satellite imagery:
What this shows is (a) no eye, and (b) a lot of convective activity - rainy thundery sorts of things. The convection is because there is a lot of warm water in the Gulf with the upper 75m warmer than 26 deg C, but the good news is that as he gets into the northern Gulf, the warm water is shallower - as you can see by the blue areas in this map of the depth of the 26 deg C water:
That is most likely because of the previous stormy weather you have all had up there (Sally, I believe was one of them). This will stop him from intensifying if he goes over those blue areas. Also slowing down his growth is some dry air which is moving in from the west and is now over the south Texas coast. Wind shear is still on the weaker side, so we'll see how much more he intensifies tomorrow.
Remember, listen to your local emergency managers. Run from the water, hide from the wind - meaning that if you live in a flood zone and you can evacuate, that would be a good idea.
More tomorrow!
Ciao,
J.
Twitter: jyovianstorm
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 local 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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