Iceberg

The eye has made landfall at willmington. Much as the ec has predicted for many days. Winds over 100mph reported. Small miracle that Florence failed to organise correctly after her erc. The difference between 100 and 150 mph winds is huge. Winds might well get a little high. Max rain is currently 17inches roughly. Maybe a few places a bit higher but of course the eye has only just made it to the coast. Last post from me as I don’t really like the affects and from a weather POV it’s all over for Florence as a hurricane. Tha damage and death toll will be severe though.

Sorry went to bed but here are the the adt Dvorak as well. http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/real-time/adt/odt06L.html raw t dropped when I went to sleep , recon came in and looking at loops she ingested a lot of dry air. that has now mixed out at t numbers are increasing again Back to 6.2. Recon has been very bad so far roughly every 12 hrs. I know that some have been cancelled due to other issues but for one of the largest hurricanes hitting the east coast in years it’s a shame they this level of lack of funding and resources. Some winds. Sustained 3 hr gusts as they will cause the damage they are very bad for over qtr of a million people. The storm surge will be huge for a storm sitting off the coast. This is one of the biggest shiping areas and the docks and any boats that don’t leave could well be destroyed leading to a loss of a lot of industry. Rain will be a major issue and from experience they are pretty rubbish at predicting it even 24 hrs out as outflow and bands just won’t be placed. Forecasts to this point will be very generic imho.

T numbers have just gone to 6.3. And 6.4. 7.0 is a clear cat 5.

Yes strictly. On the below they are saying at 2pm thur she will be a cat 4. Over the next 24hrs from that she will be sat approx 3-4 miles off shore as a cat 3. But you have to remember the eye is currently 30 miles across and the hurricane winds 100 miles. The eye wall will be 5-10 miles out from the edge of the eye. So for all purposes Wilmington for example will have 24 hrs of cat 4 winds before the hurricane slows down to only 100kts before the centre reaches the coast. I’ll be honest, looking At this I would expect 70-80% of the city of Wilmington to be destroyed.

So they have raised her to 120kt which they agree could be conservative, T numbers have increased a touch since this update was written. Very bad news that the storm is bigger with bigger wind radius than they thought. Tbh it’s difficult for things to get much worse for the Carolinas. Unless of corse recon go in and find a cat 5. Microwave satellite data indicate that Florence completed a full eyewall replacement cycle (ERC) a few hours ago, and recent visible and infrared imagery suggests that the eye has contracted slightly. Outflow continues to expand in all quadrants, and the outflow jets to the northwest and east have become better defined. Satellite intensity estimates from TAFB, SAB, and UW-CIMSS ADT are all T6.0/115 kt, and recent NHC objective intensity estimates are T6.2/120 kt. Given that the eye has mostly cleared out and has also warmed to near 19 deg C, the initial intensity has been bumped upward to 120 kt, which could be conservative. All of the wind radii had to be expanded/increased based on a blend of the earlier reconnaissance data and a 1430 UTC ASCAT scatterometer pass.

Meto mogreps ens after with the ec. The sharp turn back down the coast is clearly visible in most of them. Yikes! florence atm has the highest dvorak t rating that it’s had from adt at 6.2. The system is going through some deep intensification currently. With multiple tornados in the eye wall. Still no recon for ages but I think we might have flight winds if 160-170kts and surface winds of 125-135kts. Ie I think this is right on the edge of a cat 5 at the moment. Without recon I am hearing that nhc are about to up her to 120kts which is conservative.

Ec has taken a nasty twist. It stalls the system just offshore with the eye over water but the eye wall just reaching land for 2-3 days Rainfall totals. Some areas 1m of rain. Wilmington for example has gusts of 100mph or more continuously for nearly 48 hrs

Couple of pics from a few mins ago. Shame there is no recon in her atm

Pressure looks to be falling again down from 952 to 950. Deep connective ring again around the new 3-4 Times the size eye.

ALso these from the set prior. Thats 17 recording in a row of flight winds over 100kt in a single sector.

Probably the most freightening thing I’ve seen today from Florence. Flight winds of 143kts with high winds either side indicating a very strong ne quad eye wall. With surface winds yet to respond Given the disorganisation still in the eye this will only go up considerably.

Rainfall and surges are the biggest issues, but the wind could cause the longest timeframe damage. Often under a cat 1-3 hurricane winds are actually pretty isolated to a small 5-20m range. For Florence this could well be 100-120m. With the most destructive winds capable of destroying buildings over 60 miles. The pressure is a driving force behind storm surge as well.

Ne quad sampled in the last 5 mins. 112kts max. Just enough barely to support a 115kts cat 4.

Recon are doing a run, first for nearly 12 hrs though the eye. Max winds around 100kts so back to a cat 3 from that. Higher winds will probably be found in the ne quad though that support a cat 4. Pressure rise to 952mb. No surprised given the large 40-50m eye that’s teying to form. If that does form then a pressure fall to 920-925mb could well be on the cards, Florence is very much trying to put the building blocks in place for a run at cat 5. Big question is will it work or will she continue to struggle. Crunch 12 hrs coming up.

Erc still ongoing. She continues to keep trying.

Inner Eye wall has weakened again and the last remnants of the attempted erc look like they might get absorbed into the Eye making it a bit bigger.

I’ve been holding off posting for the last two hrs trying to make sense if the models and Florence. This is just my opinion so take it with a pinch of salt. Gfs is another silly run, it has it touching the outer banks, going back out to see and then coming back sw and making landfall again at the Carolinas border. Ec is bang on the last few runs. Hitting just south of willmington. Since it initiated well I would strongly favour this solution. Imho there isn’t a model that exists that will predict intensification from now to landfall. It will all be down tk internals and Florence herself. There was certainly an attempt at an ewrc. This was forced on the hurricane by a lack of outflow. Which allowed the eyewall to become week and dry air to enter the system. This conversely set off better outflow and provided a turbo boost to the convection band. The attempt at an erc was swept away and the eye wall become greatly strengthened. The remains of the attempted erc have been pushed out. But enough of an erc has taken place to provide a likely expanded eye Sometimes, this can be sufficient to allow a period of intensification as the core has more vigour to contract. Sometimes, it just leads to a period of stagnation. Regardless, Florence is starting to become a big hurricane in size. All of these internal changes are probably just expanding the sustained 70-100mph winds by quite a margin. The next few hours will see her looking scary again imho.

I didn’t want to put the cat 5 one up until/unless it reaches cat 5 as it always scares the hell out of me !

It’s very rare to get a major hurricane hitting the us mainland, let alone a cat 4, and certainly a cat4-5 boarderline. Looks like they evacuate the entire north and South Carolina coastlines and willmington over 1m people in total.

Category 4 taken from nhc. Catastrophic damage will occur: Well-built framed homes can sustain severe damage with loss of most of the roof structure and/or some exterior walls. Most trees will be snapped or uprooted and power poles downed. Fallen trees and power poles will isolate residential areas. Power outages will last weeks to possibly months. Most of the area will be uninhabitable for weeks or months.

Discussion Unfortunately, the models were right. Florence has rapidly intensified into an extremely dangerous hurricane, with 30-second GOES-16 visible imagery showing well-defined eyewall mesovortices rotating inside of the eye. A NOAA Hurricane Hunter aircraft found peak SFMR winds of about 120 kt, with flight-level winds and dropsonde measurements also supporting that value for the initial wind speed estimate. Notably, the aircraft data also show the size of the hurricane-force winds has doubled in the past 12 hours.

Latest update goes with 939mb at 120kts. Maybe a touch conservative with max winds during the timeframe of 135kts so just below cat 5. At present hurricane winds extent 70miles in diameter.

Quite a thick eye wall and spread of 100+kt flight winds. This is expanding considerably. All the below in the ne quad after centre pass through.

Ec and meto ens.

Recon have a recording of 125kts in the nw quad. Nhc update might go with that. So either 120 or 125kts.