Philippe’s track keeps shifting west, and contrary to NHC’s forecast as recently as yesterday, the storm tracked directly across Antigua and Barbuda, and is impacting Anguilla as well. Here are their Key Messages regarding Tropical Storm Philippe (en Español: Mensajes Claves), and my TAOS/TC impact swath based on the latest (5am ET 3Oct) forecast:
Given the westward shift, there is a bit more damage across the Islands, although fortunately Philippe remains a moderate tropical storm. Estimated economic impacts are now up to $4 Million USD, with flash flooding extending across more of the Leeward Islands. It does look like the storm is finally starting its northward turn, so Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands should not be seeing any significant effects.
In the Pacific there is good news – it seems the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) really overestimated the strengthening trend and the forecast impacts of Typhoon Koinu (WP142023) is only expected to make landfall as an 80 knot storm instead of a 110 knot monster. Still, economic impacts are likely to be in the $2 Billion range. Here is the new impact swath based on the JTWC forecast:
On this track, it looks like the storm will only be of tropical storm strength when it makes landfall on the mainland, in which case the main impacts will be flash flooding. There has been extensive flooding across China this year, so that’s still a worse thing than it sounds at first glance.