crimsone

Are you sure? I'm not seeing those in the data. The highest I can find presently is 130.4 at the surface. (There was a 172.6 mph wind at flight level, but it was contained within a suspect set of observations)

000 URNT12 KWBC 081349 VORTEX DATA MESSAGE AL112017 A. 08/13:20:45Z B. 21 deg 47 min N 074 deg 55 min W C. NA D. 104 kt E. 232 deg 15 nm F. 333 deg 124 kt G. 234 deg 19 nm H. 928 mb I. 15 C / 2468 m J. 20 C / 2454 m K. 19 C / NA L. CLOSED M. C40 N. 12345 / NA O. 0.1 / 1 nm P. NOAA2 2011A IRMA OB 21 MAX OUTBOUND FL WIND AND MAX FL WIND 150 KT 035 / 25 NM 13:27:02Z CNTR DROPSONDE SFC WIND 000 / 00 KTS

Speaking as someone with a degree in the biological sciences, hell only knows... but they DO redistribute heat from the tropics to the poles, which is a pretty essential factor in the fact that the earth is habitable.

pressure of 944mb just reported in Jose (well.... 11:53z)

This is basically Jupiter's Big Red Spot.

Shame that the British Government doesn't do an equally wonderful job of making sure preparations are well in place beforehand... ... if they did, the military and various aid workers and supplies could have been there yesterday.

When you're Mission 19 into Irma (11L), but you just figure you'll fly around it instead and hope nobody notices... Mission 20, however, seems to have decided not to go back to base after all, and is taking a quick jaunt over Providenciales, where winds between 63 and 75 MpH are still blowing.

Should be at last possible to send someone to the Turks and Caicos in a 2 to 4 hours. Hopefully we'll get some news out of there soon after.

They've just reached the eye. Or at least, what they thought was the eye before making a bit of a course correction. If last night is anything to go by, that'll be about 30 mins until a vortex message, but that was USAF and this mission is NOAA, so we'll see. Meanwhile, as a second hurricane hunter is launched and makes its way into Irma, a third is currently entering into Jose, while to the west of the imge, a fourth Hurricane Hunter is entering Katia. DAMN that's a busy day for the recon teams!

Yeaaah. Oops. I don't know how in the hell I mistyped that. Hell of a big difference. 29.3 C

NOAA2 going for another pass through the eye, taking SSTs as she goes, unusually. 29.3 degrees C as she moves towards cuba.

Down to 919 mb... though the eye doesn't appear to have been where they expected it?? URNT12 KNHC 080300 VORTEX DATA MESSAGE AL112017 A. 08/02:35:40Z B. 21 deg 19 min N 072 deg 29 min W C. 700 mb 2384 m D. 125 kt E. 330 deg 11 nm F. 069 deg 141 kt G. 323 deg 22 nm H. 919 mb I. 9 C / 3054 m J. 19 C / 3048 m K. 7 C / NA L. OPEN SE M. C22 N. 12345 / 7 O. 0.02 / 1 nm P. AF309 1811A IRMA OB 15 MAX FL WIND 141 KT 323 / 22 NM 02:27:00Z CNTR DROPSONDE SFC WIND 110 / 11 KT RAGGED INNER EYEWALL WITH OUTER EYEWALL FORMING

Looks like Comms just went out on at least part of Providenciales island. Facebook livestreams just all went dead. Eye of the storm should start tracking across the north of the island in a couple of hours.

Typo in the above image. Should be 00:55z, not 23:55z

VDM reported. NE quadrant of eye - 161mph pressure: 291mb Eye: Eliptical - 30/22/16

SW eye - 123mph

VDM finally reported: 920mb. Closed 20 mile eye.

It's weaker in that corner anyway... ... but yes, it appears to have weakened ~slightly~. Still Cat 5 though. Waiting for a VDM to get an accurate read on pressure, but you don't get one of those without a dropsonde.

... aaaand 158 mph wind found in the NW corner on the way back out.

Location of the eye (117mph winds found on the way in):

Indeed. Seems sufficient to overwash one or two of these islands with quite some force.

Recon just getting to the CDO now. Info from the SE eye coming "soon".

Here's what it says about "significant wave height" rather than "swell wave height". I don't know how accurate this modelled radar is, but by damn, I'm hoping it's off by a country mile.

Oh god, please no.

Vertical shear may be a factor.